Never Got Over You
by twenteseven
Summary: AU Stendan. Brendan and Ste were at school together years ago, and had a brief but intense secret fling that neither of them have forgotten. They're both 25 now, and they both seem to have moved on with their lives, until they see each other again for the first time in years, and everything changes. Rated M.
1. Chapter 1

**Never Got Over You**

_**So, I had this little idea a while back and was going to make it into a longer fic but I don't think I'll have time, so I've done it as a little three parter whilst I work out some finer details for the rest of Get Away.**_

_**The summary says it all really. This chapter is Ste's POV, next will be Brendan's, and third is a mix of the two.**_

_**I've never written in this style before so I have no idea if this is any good, or even if this story is interesting in any way. Some parts may be a little OOC, apologies if that's the case.**_

_**Please review to let me know what you think :) **_

**1**

You wonder if it's all in your head.

You know you were young, and the kind of things you remember – the feelings you remember – they aren't real when you're that young. Are they? They might have felt real at the time, sure, but that's because you were too young to know that there's a whole world out there. You were naïve. Inexperienced. You didn't know what _love _was back then.

That's what you tell yourself.

You tell yourself it was a teenage crush. Puppy love.

You tell yourself you need to see him though - just once - just to know for sure that you're over him.

You convince yourself that's what would happen. That you would see him, have a polite conversation, realise that fizzing in your stomach and breathlessness in your chest – the rapidity of your heart when it used to explode in your chest – you tell yourself that would all be gone, and you'd feel nothing; and you'd have closure. You're sure that's how it would go.

You're _almost _sure that's how it would go.

You think back to when you met him, when you were 11. He was in your form group. He was nothing to you to begin with – just a guy who got along with Tom, one of the lads who lived down your street and who you used to walk to the bus stop with. You and Tom had nothing in common other than your shared childhood spent re-enacting Gladiators games in your front garden whilst your parents left you to go off to their mutual drinking haunt, returning hours later when it was well past dusk and the gnats had bitten you both to death. As you grew up you both realised how alcoholism was tearing both of your families apart, and you spotted his bruises from time to time just as he spotted yours. Neither of you mentioned anything, though; but the unspoken knowledge made your friendship strained. You had separate friendship groups at school to alleviate the awkwardness.

Brendan became a well established member of Tom's group. Yours were mainly girls.

You remember when he first spoke to you. Food Tech, aged 13. You were paired together, and he made you laugh when his eyes lit up at the mention of using a blow torch to finish off the crème brulee. He quickly established it as his signature dish, despite you insisting that it had been mainly your hands that had created _his _so-called masterpiece.

You paired up with him for Food Tech every week from then on. You always suspected he chose to stick by you because he thought you were a good cook. He was always so impatient to eat the food you made. It warmed your insides to think that there was something he liked about you, and you got to know each other over the two years that you were partners in that class. Sometimes he would smile at you with such devotion in his eyes that you would have to look away before your heart stopped beating. Sometimes you would catch each other's eye and you would see him catch his breath in his throat, and you wondered if he was starting to feel that same unfamiliar lurch inside that you felt when you looked at him.

You looked forward to Food Tech every week. You were never ill on a Tuesday; neither was he.

You were 15 before the rumours started. You were never sure why people started to suspect you – or who started the rumours – because you'd never given anything away. Never looked at another guy for too long, other than Brendan. You'd never even admitted it to yourself, let alone tell other people. And you'd had girlfriends – plenty of them. A lot of girls in school fancied you, and there were a couple of house-party-bathroom-fumbles and numerous caught-behind-the-bikeshed moments that should have put paid to the rumours about you being gay. But for some reason, they had stuck.

You know now that it was probably one of the lads from your form group, one of the football team lads - who you now know is gay too because you saw him in the backroom of that gay bar up in Manchester. He had fled as soon as he'd seen you spot him. You're sure he must have picked up on it back then and spread the word to deflect any suspicion away from him, and you're sure he's probably just as closeted now as he was back then.

You don't hate him for it though. You know how it is.

You still hate Tom though, for turning his back on you once the rumours started. And you hate his group of tag-alongs who took it upon themselves to make your life a living hell. Despite your insistence that you'd never look at another man, it was as if they could see through you.

They started to push you around. Brendan included. After school, during school, down the park at weekends. Any time you were unfortunate enough to be alone in their company. You lost sight of which bruises were from them and which were from your abusive step-dad, Terry.

Sometimes you saw Brendan hold back when the rest of them laid into you, uncertainty clouding his expression.

Sometimes Brendan was the worst.

And they never stopped. Even when your best friend Amy Barnes gave birth to a baby girl six months later, and told everyone you were the father so as to save her having to tell people it was some random guy she met; they didn't stop. You thought it would prove your heterosexuality; but they didn't stop.

Something did change, though.

Brendan started looking at you differently, when he thought you were a father. He seemed confused.

He'd asked you about it one day – said he wasn't aware that you and Amy had ever been a couple. He found it strange you'd never mentioned her in class.

You weren't sure whether to tell him the truth or not.

You shrugged him off, and you wondered what the hell it mattered to him, but he looked back at you and it was like it used to be, before the rumours started. It almost looked like he cared again.

You noticed him watching you still, his eyes boring into your soul from across the canteen, or from whichever room you both found yourselves in together.

He always looked so conflicted.

A week or so later, you realised why.

It was after hours – you'd both been kept behind for detention – and you realised you were alone with him in the cloakroom, and you'd feared his wrath straight away, all too aware that if it were Tom you'd been left with, he'd already have you pinned to the wall.

But Brendan didn't hit you.

He backed you into the wall; but not like Tom would have done. He pressed his body up against yours, and he looked at you in the same way he used to in Food Tech, and you felt his hardness up against you, and you finally understood it all.

He pushed his lips against yours.

And your world changed in that moment.

You had hesitated, then kissed him back.

And your eyes had been opened to a whole new world.

Within two months you'd slept together – you'd done everything together. You were each others dirty little secret.

You found every excuse to be alone together, and you devoured every second of it when you were.

You kept it a secret, and over the year that followed you became closer to him than you'd ever been to another person. Physically, emotionally – in every way possible.

His friends still beat you from time to time; he still let them. A part of you understood; another part hated him for it.

You'd carried on seeing girls in your class. Maybe you did it to get back at him. Maybe you still wanted to believe you weren't gay.

He hated it, he asked you to stop. He said he couldn't handle anybody else touching you, thinking they could get close to you – even if he knew it was just for show. You told him people would get suspicious if you suddenly didn't have a string of girls on speed dial.

You didn't sleep with any of them anymore, though. That part of you belonged to Brendan. For that year of your life, every part of you was devoted to him.

Until you fucked it all up.

Until he pulled your strings one too many times, refusing to speak to you in front of his friends because they still saw you as the little queer; refusing to acknowledge you as you walked past him in the hallway.

You'd spend all evening fucking each other senseless, desperately searching for somewhere you could be alone together, taking al fresco sex to a whole new level; you'd spend all night in broken sleep as you text each other explicitness and dreamt of a world where the two of you were together in the open; and then you'd spend all day pretending you didn't know each other's last name.

You had enough of it. Amy had a house party, and Brendan was invited, and he ignored you all night, wouldn't even look you in the eye, so you made a point of letting Amy drape herself over you, and you made sure Brendan and all his mates heard you when you took her upstairs and fucked her.

He didn't speak to you for a month after that.

It was at the next house party – at some random lads house from your year group – when you broke your silence. You were horny as hell, and you missed him so much you cried at night, and you couldn't handle it anymore. So you followed him outside when he went for a cigarette, and you begged for him to talk to you, and he couldn't look you in the eye, and you felt the tears fall from your eyes, and he caught them with his thumb, and he looked as broken as you felt, and you knew he wanted to forgive you. You kissed him, out in the open, in the back garden. For a glorious second, he let you kiss him, and he kissed you back. He told you to meet him upstairs, and he went back inside, and you followed him discreetly. It was a massive house, and he found a bedroom that he locked you both into as soon as you walked in. He checked you were alone, and then he fucked you twice in the space of half an hour.

You told him you loved him.

You meant it.

He smiled back at you. You thought he wanted to say it too, but you knew he wasn't one for words. He kissed you, and that was as close to affirmation as you were going to reach.

The next day Amy told you she was pregnant with your son, Lucas.

You told Brendan after school. You went round to his – he was home alone – and you made sure he fucked you senseless before you dropped the bombshell, and you savoured every second of it because you knew everything would change when you told him.

You were right. He kicked you out – threw your clothes out of the front door after you – and told you he didn't want to speak to you ever again.

When he had calmed down a few days later, you found him online at the same time as you. You'd spent hours flirting on chat over the years – your conversations taking a rather more explicit nature recently – but your last ever chat conversation was one you've never forgotten. He told you to be the father you needed to be. He told you you had responsibilities now. And he told you he'd never forgive you for what you did across him with Amy. That he would never get over the sounds he heard as you'd fucked her in the room above him at that party.

You knew you had two months until you left school, and you asked him how you were meant to get through two whole months of seeing him everyday and never talking to him. He said he didn't care. He said he couldn't forgive you.

He stayed true to his word.

You still can't believe it's been over seven years since you last saw him. You know his family moved further away – to the other side of town – but he's still close enough. Close enough for a chance meeting on a night out, or in the shopping mall, or at the local music festival that everyone you know seems to go to. You know he isn't into the same things as you are, but he still has friends from school, he still speaks to people that you've bumped into numerous times over the years. So why never him?

You think about him all the time. You know it's wrong – you're married now, after all – but you can't help yourself. Sometimes you dream of him so vividly that you're worried when you wake up that you might have given something away – that you might have called out his name in your sleep. Your husband woke you up one morning with a blow job and you came so hard you'd almost screamed the house down, and he looked so pleased with himself that he'd done that to you, and you can't ever tell him that you had been thinking of Brendan the whole time. You were in that delicious moment between dreaming and sleeping and you had almost been able to smell the aftershave Brendan used to wear, and all of that orgasm had belonged to Brendan.

You met Doug when you were seventeen. He was at your college, doing a course in business management, and he offered you support when he heard about you coming out down the grapevine. He told you he was gay too, and that he was there for you if you needed someone. You liked him straight away.

It was only a few months after things had turned sour with Brendan, and you were drawn to his openness. He was warm, safe, loving. It was something you weren't used to, at the time. You fell for him quickly.

You still felt as if something was always missing.

You cheated on Doug, to begin with. Cheated on him with strangers, with one night stands from nights out. You cheated on him with Brendan. You were getting out of a taxi after a night out, waving at Doug as he drove off in the taxi, when Brendan stumbled out of a party at Tom's house and he dragged you by the elbow and fucked you in the alleyway that lead down to the park, and he didn't even speak to you, and you didn't use protection, and you'd been screened with Doug by this point and you spent months worrying about whether Brendan had given you anything before you plucked up the courage to get screened again by yourself and got the all clear.

That was the last time you'd seen Brendan. He didn't even speak to that night – just fucked you, kissed you like his whole life depended on it, then walked away.

You hadn't known whether to text him the next day, or call him. In the end you left it so long that the moment had passed. You didn't even know if he had the same number anyway.

Two years later, he added you on Facebook.

You spent four hours scouring every single detail on his profile. There wasn't much on there – you were shell shocked that he had even set one up – but you drank in every minor detail like you had been starved of him. You noticed that he'd got a moustache. It made you laugh, because on anyone else it would look ridiculous. But he totally pulled it off, and you smiled at how much it suited him, and you thought about how differently it would feel to kiss him with it.

The first thing you checked was his relationship status. It's Complicated with some girl called Eileen. You didn't like it. It's Complicated. What does that even mean? You worked out it must mean that it wasn't working but that neither of them wanted to admit it. You hated that it might mean Brendan might love her too much to let her go. You consoled yourself, told yourself Brendan wouldn't give Eileen what she needed – he was gay, after all – and that must have been putting a strain on their relationship. He likes fucking men, that's what would be causing the complication. Only you doubted he'd admitted it to her.

For a fleeting moment, you let yourself believe that he couldn't commit to anyone because he still loved you.

You gathered he was at University – Sheffield by the looks – and that he didn't use Facebook much. That didn't surprise you. He started his profile in September, and you guessed it was pressure from Uni friends. He had only ever updated his status twice in 2 months. He'd been tagged in a few pictures, sat in the corner of a packed room with a tumbler of whiskey; vacant expression. He was tagged in a club, looking bored to his teeth. He was tagged necking some girl that wasn't Eileen in a club, and you guessed that's why things were complicated between them.

You saw that he'd been tagged in a picture with Eileen too – a holiday photo of the two of them. You were curious, so you clicked on her photo's, and you grinned to yourself when you saw her profile wasn't set to private. You regretted it instantly. You found all her pictures, and Brendan was in so many of them. Turned out she was a friend of the family. Turned out they did everything together. You saw a picture of the two of them together on New Years Eve 2005 – you could see it all on the banners behind their smiling faces. You realised that you were fucking him around the time that picture was taken. You wondered if he cheated on you with Eileen; it left your blood running cold.

You had shut down the laptop and rejected Doug's call when it came through to you that night. You cried yourself to sleep with one man on your mind, and it wasn't your boyfriend.

You were living in London at that point. You were at Cookery School down there – a one year course Doug had agreed to pay for so that the pair of you could open your own restaurant up in Chester – and you did the whole long distance relationship thing with him for a while. It worked – the distance did you good, if anything – and when you returned, he had set up the business plan and found some premises that you both loved. You were half way through decorating the place when he proposed, and you'd said yes without hesitation. Within a year you were married and running your own restaurant business together. Another year and the business started turning a profit. Now you're downright successful – three booming restaurants, detached house in the Cheshire countryside and a holiday home in the south of France. You drive an Audi TT convertible. It reminds you of the day you and Brendan had been hanging around one summer's day and you'd walked past one parked on the kerb, with it's hood down, and he'd jumped in and let you take a picture of him on your phone with his shades on and he looked like a movie star.

You printed that picture out at the local Boots store on an instant photo machine, and you still had it at the bottom of a box in your wardrobe. Sometimes you take it out and look at it, and you remember him. Sometimes the tears prick the insides of your eyes when you let yourself think about him; when you see his smile beaming back at you.

You've never told Doug the real reason you chose to buy that particular car.

You always wonder why you've never bumped into him. You thought fate was meant to bring people together if they were made to be with each other.

You tell yourself it must be because you were just young. It was just puppy love, wasn't it? Not like you were part of some grand design of life, or anything.

You checked his profile from time to time, to see what had changed. One night, when you were drunk, you logged in and typed out a whole message to him. You never sent it, but you told him you were sorry. You knew it was you that fucked up – it was you that left him – and you wrote that you weren't sure if it was all in your head, and you weren't sure if you'd ever mattered to him the way that he mattered to you, and that you weren't sure if it would ever mean anything to him, but you told him you were sorry anyway, and that you hoped that he was happy, and that you would always love him.

You didn't send it.

You sobered up just in time to delete it.

After a few months – just after you announced your engagement – you went to check his profile as had become part of your routine, and you noticed that it had been deleted. You weren't surprised – you didn't think it would be his thing after all.

You missed him more than you expected.

When you're living back in Chester and opening up your restaurant, you meet up with some school friends and his name is mentioned in passing – something about him being arrested for a drug deal – and your heart physically aches for him. You yearn to know that he's alright.

When you see Tom on a night out a few weeks later, he nods to you across the bar as if he hadn't spent a year of his life making yours hell, and you nod back because you can't be arsed to hate him, and because he looks at you like he's sorry. And because you want to ask him what's happened to Brendan. But the moment passes again, and you lose sight of him, and you're left in the dark.

You kick yourself when you get home that night, and you search for his Facebook profile again on your phone as you're lying in bed. It's still deleted, and you try twitter just incase he's on there now. He isn't. You google his name but nothing comes up other than an old newspaper article about the time he chased down and caught a guy that had stolen his sister's handbag. He was fucking you around the time that photo was taken too, and it makes you smile.

You realise that you miss him.

Doug asks you what you're looking at when he joins you in bed. You tell him you heard an old school friend had been arrested, and you were looking for gossip but couldn't find any. You don't tell him that school friend was the love of your life. You don't tell him hardly a day goes by when you don't think about him.

You married Doug in a beautiful ceremony, surrounded by the people you love, and you mean it every time you tell him that you love him. You do love him. He's everything you could want in a guy, and your life together couldn't be more perfect. He's your best friend, you run a successful business together, and your kids adore him. Amy approves. He gets on with your friends, although you don't have many. He's attractive enough, and he makes you smile. And he's from New York, so he's already allowed you to travel further than you ever thought a scally like you would be able to.

He's everything you could ever want, and you really can see yourself spending the rest of your life with him. You love him.

But you know something is missing.

You still think of Brendan. You still wonder what if. You're still aware that you've never felt that gut-wrenching breathlessness with anyone other than him. And you know Doug will never be a match for him when it comes to sex. Brendan was out of this world.

You're watching TV with Doug one night, some American drama series that he loves, and there's a romantic moment where two characters finally end up together, and fireworks go off in the background. Doug laughs and passes comment about how nothing like 'the fireworks' exists in real life, and you laugh back, and you think of Brendan, and you realise you don't agree with your husband.

But you tell yourself it was just because you were young. You thought you loved him, and you thought he was incredible, and your body made you feel strange things because you were young. Because you hadn't been with anyone before. Because he was your first love.

You never forget your first love, they always say. But that doesn't mean you should end up with them, does it? And those feelings he used to give you – they don't last do they? You remember someone telling you that all those feelings you get, the fireworks, they're just chemical reactions in the brain, and they're scientifically proven to only last around a year. And you think to yourself – what have Brendan and I got when all of that fizzles away? You doubt he can give you what you know Doug can give you for the rest of your life – comfort, and security – so you tell yourself you're better off without him.

You try to be silently thankful that you haven't bumped into him in all those years.

But it feels like you're lying to yourself.

You're busy with Doug and the business and with Leah and Lucas, and the years tick by and you're happy. Everything is set up for you. Friends are jealous of your life – the perfect husband, perfect career, perfect children. They don't know about the aching inside of you. Nobody does.

You've never told anybody about you and Brendan. When you first came out to Amy, she asked if you'd ever fancied anyone at school, and you told her you fancied him. She laughed at you, and told you to keep dreaming, and asked if you were going to be one of those gays who only ever went after straight men. She had no idea, so you laughed it off.

You had no inclination to tell anyone else about you and Brendan. You didn't think anybody would understand. Most of your friends went to school with you, and you questioned whether they would actually believe you. You could prove it to them – you could produce the transcript of one of your online conversations that you'd printed off to keep for sentimental reasons at the time because he'd sent you a link to the song 'Angel' by Massive Attack and said it was one of his favourites, before he told you it reminded him of you, and that was the closest you ever came to a declaration of love. But you didn't want anyone else to see that. It felt too private – too personal.

And you didn't want to betray his trust, either. You weren't sure he would want anyone to know about you – if he was ready to tell the world who he was. So you kept it to yourself.

You carry it around with you. You carry around the memories, and you carry around the fact that you miss him, and you carry around the constant doubt about whether you actually ever meant anything to him.

You think about the memories of the two of you together, and you play over them time and time again, and you wonder if you elaborated any of it for you own satisfaction.

You wonder if it's all in your head.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Wow, thank you all so much for your reviews. It really means so much! I was really underconfident with this story - even more so than usual - so it was ridiculously lovely to read your response.**_

_**This is part 2, Brendan's POV. I haven't had time to properly edit for errors so apologies if there are any.**_

_**Please let me know what you think :)**_

_**PS There may be more that 3 parts in total - maybe 4 or possibly 5 now. I've gotten a bit carried away writing part 3 so I'm going to split it into different chapters.**_

**2**

You wonder if it's all in your head.

You know he's married now, and you can tell that he's moved on, and he's got everything that you hoped he would get in life, and you can't help but feel a little bit proud of him.

You wonder if he even remembers you.

Steven was the most attractive guy in your year – all of the girls were after him – and you had him. You had every part of him – and you had him in every way. And he loved you.

He told you that.

But you didn't believe him. He was young, after all – you both were. You couldn't have understood what love was. Sure, it felt real. It felt fucking indescribable. But it must have just been the hormones, exaggerating what was essentially just a crush, right? You were 16, 17. You couldn't possibly have been truly in love at that age.

You still wish you'd said it back to him though. You hope he never doubts that you felt it.

You grew into your looks. You weren't as attractive as he was at school. Now you've grown the 'tache and you know it suits you, and you've bulked out a little at the gym, and you notice girls turn their heads when you pass. You know they're checking out the way your suit trousers cling to your arse. You know it looks good. You know nobody looks quite as good as you do in a suit.

You know the pair of you together would look fucking divine now.

But at school you were plain, normal looking. Nothing special about you. Brown hair, dirty blue eyes. You wonder what he ever saw in you.

You weren't special like he was – with his cheeky grin and his never ending lashes – and that feisty attitude that made your heart race when you saw it kick in. He wasn't even aware of it though. Sure, he knew he could have most of the girls in your year group. But he never really understood why. He thought the girls were like that with everyone – but they weren't.

He was never arrogant with it, never thought he was better than you. He would smile and chat and flirt with everyone, and when you'd finally got together his flirtiness with other people made your hackles rise every time. But you knew he wasn't doing it intentionally. And you knew that he never looked at anyone the way that he looked at you.

And you saw whenever he stared into your eyes that he changed. He smiled at you like he didn't smile at anybody else; his eyes widened like they were trying to take in every tiny details of your features; his chest rose as he took in a long deep breath – like for a moment he had forgotten to breath because he'd been so wrapped up in watching you – and you understood that because it was exactly how he made you feel.

You loved him to the ends of the earth and back.

You remember the first time you realised that you liked him, as a friend. You always looked forward to Tuesdays, in Food Tech, and you realised it was because you liked his company. You felt comfortable with him, in a way that you never felt comfortable with other people. Everything had always seemed so forced before, and yet with him, it was so easy. He made you laugh. He helped you, without it feeling like he was patronising you. He was genuinely happy for you when you got something right.

You developed feelings for him when you were about 14. You were maturing, growing up, hitting puberty, and because of what your Dad did to you – because of what he had started doing to you when you were eight years old – you repulsed yourself with the thoughts you had about Steven late at night. A man thinking about another man in _that way _was wrong. That's what Seamus told you.

Despite what he did to you – how he touched you – he told you it was wrong for you to want another man. You block the thoughts from your mind. You learnt a long time ago to block it out, to separate your own sexuality from the memory of what he did to you.

When you were arrested for dealing drugs later on in life, and you spent 6 months inside, you saw a therapist, and they could see. They knew what was wrong with you. They tried to fix you – they couldn't finish the job – but they gave it a go. And you've coped with it better ever since.

You still find it difficult.

You remember when you realised you wanted him. _Like that. _You were 15. The rumours about him being gay hadn't started yet, and you were sat next to him in class. Mrs Brickley in Food Tech decided that for the final project she would mix the groups up, and she split the two of you up. She put Steven with Amy Barnes, because she couldn't cook to save her life, and Steven was the best in the group. You watched him all lesson – watched the two of them as they laughed together – and you felt anger rise up inside of you. You were jealous.

You wanted Steven all to yourself.

You suppressed it as well as you could for a while, working the anger out of yourself with a frustrated wank every night.

You hated Amy Barnes.

After you'd been split up in Food Tech you didn't speak much to Steven. You'd never been friends outside of the lesson, and besides a polite nod to each other when you passed in the corridor, you were nothing to each other for a short while. Despite him being everything to you inside your head.

When the rumours started circulating that he was gay, you joined in with Tom and the others when they expressed their disgust, because it's what you father had told you to feel, and you agreed to join them in teaching him a lesson.

The first time they beat him, you stood at the back and tried to hide your face. You were torn. You wanted so much to protect him – you remember the rush of panic that flooded through your body – and yet you could hear the words spinning around your head – a mixture of your father's voice and Tom's – repeating time after time how being gay was sick; it was a sin. It was unnatural.

You didn't have the strength within you back then to fight against it. You'd just turned 16, and you couldn't make a stand about how wrong it was to hurt him. Not when all your mates were in on it. Not when you father had instilled those ideals into you.

And yet it left you with a physical ache inside. Each and every time.

It still does.

You hate yourself for it now. You hope he hates you just as much for it too. You know you deserve his hatred.

If he even remembers you.

That first time, though - he noticed you; and he looked at you like he was begging you to help him. You turned away and left him.

You were always caught between helping him and hating him in the beginning. A part of you blamed him for making you have those feelings – for being so fucking beautiful that you couldn't help but spend all night thinking about fucking him. You knew it wasn't really his fault, but you needed something to let your anger out on.

You remember the first time you hit him. Tom had picked up on the fact that you always held back, so you lead the way the one time, and you felt your fist connect with his ribs, and you saw the way he looked up at you with confusion, and you hated yourself so much that you smashed up your bedroom that night and downed a half bottle of whiskey to yourself, falling to sleep with tears of self-loathing stinging your eyes.

The next time Tom beat him, you stayed behind afterwards, and you checked he was ok. He looked at you just as confused as if you'd hit him yourself. He asked you why you let them do it to him, and he told you he thought you were friends. You told him you were sorry, and you scarpered.

Each time it happened you felt worse.

Each time it happened you found a new excuse to leave the lads afterwards and to go back to check he was alright. You wouldn't let him see you – you'd hide yourself from view – but you'd watch as he picked himself up, dusting off his uniform and re-packing his bag, and walking on like nothing had ever happened.

You ached to tend to his wounds, to make it all better.

You started avoiding Tom, started making sure you weren't present when you thought they had something planned with Steven. You couldn't watch it anymore.

You remember when everything all changed for you.

It had been months since you'd hit him, and you walked by him when you'd been held back for detention, and you knew it was just the two of you, and you were alone, and he looked at you with such fear in his eyes, as if he thought he knew what was coming.

In that moment, you'd wanted to say something, to apologise, to explain that you hadn't wanted to do any of it. But you couldn't find the words.

So you grabbed him, and you backed him against the wall, and you took one look into his eyes before you leant in and you kissed him.

He kissed you back.

He forgave you for everything, and he understood it all when he let your bodies come together as one.

And your world changed in that moment.

You remember the first time you fucked him. You remember how you'd tried to do it everywhere, but had never been alone. You'd tried it in the school cloakroom; you'd tried it in the school bathroom; you'd tried it in the alleyway by the park; you'd tried it in the swimming pool changing rooms. You'd always been interrupted, always heard voices in the distance and broken away from each other with the fear of being caught.

Eventually you found a deserted house round the back of the cinema, and you took him there, and you were alone at last, and you sunk yourself into him and he looked up at you like you were his whole world, and you realised in that moment that you were irrevocably in love with him.

You just never told him that.

You distanced yourself from Tom's group, and Steven understood that it meant you were trying to make amends. His beatings continued, even if they were less frequent, but you had no hand in them. You wanted so badly to be able to parade him around school on your arm – to stick your fingers up to all the girls that still fawned over him because they were completely unaware of how much he loved cock – specifically your cock – but you couldn't bring yourself to do it.

You were paranoid – scared that if you dared acknowledge him in the hallway that people might know that you spent all you spare time with your cock buried deep inside of him – and you couldn't let that happen. You didn't want to be talked about, targeted like he was. You weren't strong enough to cope with that. You weren't as strong as him.

So you let him carry on with his entourage – the constant stream of girls he would flirt with and take on dates and kiss at a house party so as to deflect attention from the pair of you, as he insisted.

It just made you want him even more.

It made you want to mark him when you fucked him – and you did. And when his friends asked him once at school where he'd got his lovebite from on his neck, he looked at you and he smiled, and you heard him tell them it was some random girl he met outside football practice, and they believed him. You realised for a moment that you'd wanted him to tell them it was you. You wanted them to know that he belonged to you.

You knew he would if you'd asked him to.

But you couldn't let the world in on your secret.

You remember how much of a slut he was in the bedroom – how daring and playful he had always been – and the memory of it makes your skin come alive. He was always so pliant – so willing to try new things – and you experimented with everything you'd heard your mates talking about when they brought up the topic of sex. You loved his submissive side – how he let you think you were in control – but he was so unwittingly pushy and aware of what he wanted that you often let him take control without telling him you were giving in to him. Sometimes, though, you needed him to behave, and you loved to use his school tie to bind his hands together – to keep them under control and in line when it was your turn to devour him.

You remember how you loved to look at him in class, with that tie lying so innocently around his neck. He caught you looking a few times, and you'd flash him a grin, and you'd think about how you'd had him bound to your bed the night before, and you'd realise you were hard with the memories of it.

You kept his school tie the last time you'd used it on him.

You still have it in your wardrobe, amongst the rest of your ties. Sometimes, when you're dressing for a meeting, you feel the material between your fingers, and you're right back in that room with him, and he's yours all over again.

It breaks your heart to know that you'll never be in that moment again – that you'll never feel the pulse of his body beneath yours; and you'll never again watch his face as you tear the orgasm from his body.

You remember when he broke your heart.

You'd been so ready - so close to opening up and telling everybody who you were. You drew your strength from him, and he made you think you could face the world with your secret. You didn't want to hide him anymore, you wanted to be proud to have Steven on your arm. You were proud.

You didn't ever want him to think you were ashamed of him. You were going to make it official - make sure he knew he was your boyfriend, and you were going to kiss him in front of everybody so they were left with no doubts about it either. You were going to claim him as your own.

But you got cold feet. At Amy's party - where you'd planned to do it - the fear had gripped you, and you'd averted his gaze every time he looked your way.

You saw him drape himself over Amy, and the twitch started in your cheek. You didn't like people touching your things. Amy was drunk and she was pliant, and you knew she'd always wanted him. He'd told you not to worry about it when you'd said you didn't like him being so close to her. He'd said she was his best friend and they didn't see each other like that.

You knew Leah wasn't Steven's daughter; he'd told you that secret, but you hated the hold that Amy had over him regardless. You hated that she could click her fingers and he would come running because there was a baby involved - a baby Steven loved as his own.

You admired his selflessness, but you weren't ready to share him.

Steven had the devil in him that night. He'd had enough of your shit, and the look he gave you told you everything you needed to know. He was drunk. And he was angry. And he was disappointed in you.

You watched from the kitchen as he took her hand and lead her upstairs. He glanced at you, assessing your reaction, his eyes pleading with you to stop him. You knew he didn't want to do it, and you wanted to stop him with every fibre inside of you.

But you didn't have the strength.

So you let him go. You let him go as your heart broke inside of you.

And you listened to her moans from the room upstairs. And you heard the familiar noises he made when he came, and you cheered along with the rest of the group you were standing with as they came back downstairs, and you felt as if your world had ended.

You couldn't look at him again. You went home and you trashed your room again and you rejected every single one of his calls. You listened to his voicemails in the following days, where he pleaded with you to forgive him, and told you how sorry he was, and you believed him, you really did. You could hear it in his voice, and it killed you to hear him hurting, but you couldn't face him. You couldn't forgive him yet.

He text you. His messages changed from pleading and begging, to apologising, to tempting you with promises of what he would do to make it up to you. And you wanted it. You wanted it so bad that you almost gave in. But you couldn't get past the look in his eyes as he walked off with her - how much he had wanted to hurt you.

You couldn't ever imagine doing the same to him.

You know you had done in the past. But not now. Not now you loved him more than life itself.

Over the weeks your anger settled. You watched him at school when he wasn't looking and you knew you were still in love with him. You knew you'd forgive him eventually if he kept trying. You knew you couldn't resist him for long.

The next party came around and you heard he was going, and when he arrived he looked sexy as hell, and you had to hold yourself back from him because it had been so long and you wanted him so badly.

You walked outside, and you let him follow you, and you listened to him. You already knew he was sorry, but you let him tell you again, and you regretted being so cold with him when the tears started to roll down his face. You were sure in that moment that this thing between the two of you was just as important to him as it was to you.

You let him kiss you. You kissed him back. You didn't care who saw you.

You were ready to tell everyone. If it meant having Steven - if it meant keeping Steven - you'd promised yourself you'd tell everyone. You couldn't lose him again.

You let him follow you through the house, and you found the nearest empty bedroom, and you locked the door. Not because you cared who saw you, but because you didn't want anything to come between you. Not anymore.

It was heated, and it was hurried, and it was desperate, and it was quick the first time - too quick. But you were hard again soon enough, ready to fuck him again soon enough, and you remember that he let you, and you knew that he loved it. He loved you.

You know because he told you that.

He loved you.

It took your breath away, and you weren't sure you'd ever been as happy as you were in that moment.

You wish you'd said it back. Because now you're not sure if he ever knew how much you loved him.

You remember that for 18 hours you'd walked around like the luckiest guy in the world. For the first time in your life you felt happy. Truly happy.

You saw him again after school, and he seemed different, and he was desperate for you to fuck him, and you could tell there was something wrong, but you tried to ignore it, and you gave him what he wanted - what you wanted too - and afterwards he changed your life again.

He told you Amy was pregnant.

You remember how your heart physically hurt, and how it took all of the effort you could muster not to drop to your knees and give up on life.

You were angry. Angry again that he had done that to you. Angry that it was Amy again in the way. Angry that it changed everything.

You realise now that was the last time you properly spoke to him, face to face. The last time you let yourself look at him.

You'd been so full of anger and resentment for weeks that you couldn't look him in the eye, let alone speak to him. When you did, it was online, and you'd told him that he needed to stop fucking around, that he needed to step up and be a real father to his child, and that he couldn't do that if he was with you. You pushed him away. And the tears had stung as they'd dripped against your hands as you'd typed out the words, flowing freely from your eyes.

You pushed him away, for his own good, and for your own good.

But you've never regretted anything more.

Months later you accepted an invite to Tom's house party, despite not having spoken to him properly in months, in the full knowledge that he lived near Steven, and you drank outside in the front garden hoping to catch a glimpse of him. It was well into the early hours of the morning when he rolled up in a cab, and you saw him lean over to kiss his boyfriend, and you saw him stumble out on his own and the cab pull away, and you were blind drunk and half way to angry by this point, and he looked so fucking perfect, and you had to have him. You jumped up, almost ran towards him, and you grabbed him, and he looked affronted for all of a second before he followed you all too easily, and when you kissed him with everything that you had, he kissed you back just as desperately, and he undid your belt buckle before you'd reached for his, and you had his trousers down seconds later, and he lifted his legs to circle your waist, and you knew he wanted this – _needed _it – just as much as you did. You fucked him raw, and it was subliminal, and it was dangerous, and it was quick, and he kissed you with everything he had until you came inside of him, and he came all over your hand, and you licked it up as he leant against your shoulder, and he tasted divine.

You walked away from each other, and you lost your phone that night, and you couldn't contact him, and the next day you walked to his house because you needed to talk to him, needed to make sense of it all, and you saw him leaving his house and getting into his boyfriends car, and you saw him smile at him, and you saw him kiss him with those same lips that had devoured you last night, and you weren't sure anymore. You weren't sure if he belonged to you anymore or not.

So you walked away. Again.

You tried to carry on with your life. Without Steven to come out for, you kept yourself locked in the closet, and you made a move on Eileen when your mates started taking the piss out of you for not having anyone. Your mother and her mother were friends - you'd known her all your life. You'd never fancied her, but she'd been after you for years. She was easy to tie down, and you needed an easy option.

Things had always been strained between you two. She was everything you were not. She was confident, happy, with too many friends and too much of an interest in what other people thought of her, and of you. She was all about keeping up appearances.

It almost didn't matter to her when you turned her down when the two of you were alone. As long as you let her fawn over you in public and didn't deny the lies she told her friends about your wild sex life, she was happy enough.

She pushed you to go to University – the same one she went to – and you went along with it because the idea of moving away from home, away from your father, and away from the memories of places you'd shagged Steven was appealing to you at the time.

You'd seen him a few times – caught sight of him from the corner of your eye as he waited for the bus, or wandered through town. You made sure he didn't see you – you'd heard about his boyfriend and his impending move down to London and you knew he wouldn't be interested in being reminded of his past mistakes, so you tried to make life easier for him by staying out of his way.

You moved away to Uni, went to Sheffield, and you found some solace in the distance you had from your past life. Eileen was still there though, desperate for you to be more 'normal' as she called it, and trying to get you to integrate with her new friends.

They were cocks. All of them. You hated them.

You acted out – did things you weren't proud of, things that hurt Eileen – anything to pass the time, to make life a little more interesting. You got drunk and kissed other girls; you got into mindless fights with people she was trying desperately to get you to be friends with; you sneered at all her girlfriends and passed sarcastic comments at everything they said. You thought if you fucked things up for yourself – if you caused yourself to hurt – it might take away the constant pain in the pit of your stomach. Pain because Steven wasn't there – wasn't yours any more – and never would be again.

Things got strained with Eileen. She held onto your relationship by the tips of her fingers, but it was far from perfect, and you did everything you could to try to push her away. But she was persistent, she didn't give up. She tried to fix you. She really tried. She didn't realise you were unfixable. There was only one thing that could make you whole again, and you'd lost it.

You knew you couldn't ever have a proper relationship with her, or with anyone. Nobody would ever be Steven, and that was the root of the problem. Always would be.

She set you up a Facebook account to try to make you fit in better – to stop everyone giving you that look when you told them you didn't have a profile – and she tagged you in god knows how many picture, past and present, and the email alerts really started to piss you off. She said you were 'In a Complicated Relationship', and you hated that people knew the two of you weren't normal, healthy. You were seconds away from deleting your account when your heart stopped, as Steven's face appeared on the side of your screen. People you may know.

It was as if Facebook was taunting you.

You thought about it over a few days, and then with the courage that only whiskey could give you late one night, as you heard the party raging away downstairs in your student house, you sent him a friends request.

He accepted within half an hour, and you devoured every detail on his profile. You told Eileen you weren't feeling well and weren't going to go out with the rest of them, and you revelled in being left alone to find out all about Steven's life.

He was living in London – cookery school by the looks – and you smiled with pride that he'd followed that path. You always knew he was an amazing chef. You looked at his photos, you read his statuses. You could see he was still with his boyfriend, Doug – what kind of a name is that for a 19 year old – and it looked like Doug was missing him, the amount of times he tagged him in some soppy status. Steven never returned the favour though – all he did was upload pictures of his culinary masterpieces, his nights out with friends, and his pride and joy – his kids.

He still looked just as beautiful as he ever did.

And you realised you were still just as much in love with him as you were that day he broke your heart and shattered it into a million pieces.

You wondered if you would ever get over him.

You haven't yet.

You spent hours in the following months visiting his profile in the middle of the night, looking out for that one picture that made your stomach flip. When he's on that beach – it looks like Wales; it's definitely British – and he's rolled his jeans up and he's took his top off and he's lying down in the sand sunbathing. He's got sunglasses on and he's smiling like he knows he's having his picture taken and he's sharing a joke with whoever's taking it. And it reminds you of that Sunday afternoon you spent down by the river on that Autumn afternoon when it was so uncharacteristically hot that he'd had to strip off, and he'd lain there, and you watched him like he was the most beautiful thing you'd ever seen.

He was, of course. Still is.

There's no use even trying to deny it.

You've been with men since him, but you've never felt anything close to what you felt with Steven. Nobody compares to him.

You'd find that photo of him on the beach and you'd touch yourself whilst you traced the outline of his body with your spare hand, and you'd reach higher heights than you ever did when Eileen was with you.

You revisit his profile time and time again – usually with the sole purpose of finding that picture – but sometimes just to check up on him generally. Make sure he's still alive; make sure he's still happy.

You were shocked to go onto his profile one afternoon and find his engagement announced. You remember how you stared at the screen for seconds, before deleting your entire Facebook account and throwing your laptop at the wall.

You didn't leave your bed for three days.

You told Eileen you were ill.

You might as well have been – you felt sick to your stomach. It just wasn't food poisoning like you told her.

You remember that one week after your life ended with Steven's announcement, Eileen told you she was pregnant. You hadn't known what to do. You weren't ready to be a father – you were a student, you had no money. You were gay. How the hell had that happened?

You panicked. You proposed to her, because your sister told you that was the thing to do. She was over the moon, and accepted straight away.

You didn't plaster it all over social media like Steven had done.

You remember how his face flashed in front of yours as you'd asked her the question.

You contacted the kind of people you knew you shouldn't mess with, and you asked them for work, because you were desperate for money. You started dealing drugs to make money for your unborn child. On your third drug deal you got caught, and three weeks after your arrest Eileen had a miscarriage.

You didn't realise how devastated you would be. You didn't realise how losing a child would shake your life up so much. You came close to realising why Steven had been so attached to Leah, even though she wasn't biologically his.

You realised that everything you ever did in life – everything that ever happened to you – was always going to remind you of him.

You saw the miscarriage as your punishment. You weren't entirely sure what you were being punished for, but you'd always felt as if you needed to be punished for something. Maybe it was because you were gay – your father would certainly think so; maybe it was because you'd hurt Steven all those years ago; maybe it was because you'd let Steven walk out of your life.

Whatever it was – you took your punishment.

And then some.

You ended up going down for six months for the drug deal too. You came out of prison a changed man. You'd resisted the therapy at first, but you know now that it helped you, eventually. Helped you to accept who you were, and what had happened to you in life.

Your life changed all together when you were released.

Your engagement was off - Eileen hadn't wanted to know you since you'd become a convicted criminal. It suited you just fine, if you were honest.

You dropped out of Uni. You carried on dealing drugs. You bought a nightclub with your profits after a year or so. Dodgy dealings became the name of your game – you commanded it too. People didn't mess with you – they were scared of you. You could intimidate with the best of them. It became quite profitable for you so you stuck to it.

Now you own three clubs in the North West – two in Chester and one in Manchester. You've made quite a name for yourself in the underworld.

You fuck men that come into your club. Never more than once. Never exchanging numbers. Preferably not exchanging names.

They all look the same – skinny, light brown hair, blue eyes, pretty features. If they've got attitude that's even better. You know you're trying to find Steven's replacement.

You know no-one will ever come close.

You remember one night two years ago when he came into your club. He can't have known it was your club – you spotted him across the room and you slunk into one of the darker corners of the club, and you watched him.

You had been starved of the sight of him for a while by then, and you stopped breathing, and your heart leapt into your throat as you took in the sight of him.

Still just as beautiful; still just as full of love and life and spirit and fire as he always was.

He loved you.

This amazing creature that you watched as he laughed along with his friends, dancing as if there was no tomorrow - he had belonged to you, once upon a time. And you let him go.

You still belong to him. You know you always will.

He just doesn't want you anymore – you're sure of that.

You watched him all night; winced when you noticed the silver band on his wedding finger; turned your head when the young American with the crazy eyebrows leant in and kissed him - a little too desperately for such a public place. You couldn't look, but like a car crash you couldn't keep your eyes from flicking back up and watching them – watching him – memories flooding back of the way he used to kiss you.

You remember how you were sure he didn't kiss the guy like he used to kiss you. You're aware it might have been wishful thinking, and you know you're probably exaggerating your memories of the passion the two of you shared because it seems too fucking incredible to be true from the way you remember it. But you're sure his body used to react more to you than it did to his husband.

You were called away for work and when you returned you caught him leaving. You remember seeing him walk out of the door, letting your eyes travel to the perfect roundness of his arse, and you remember when you devoured that perfection in every way imaginable, and you can still feel the ache inside when you realised how much you want that again.

You've led a pained existence since he left your life, you realise that now. Things just don't work for you when he's not there. It's like the light disappeared from your life when you let him walk away from you.

From what you've seen of him you know it's not reciprocated – if anything, he's flourished since you let him walk away from you.

He told you he loved you.

You wonder if he ever really meant it. You wonder if he ever felt anything more than just a crush in reality. You wonder if he ever thinks of you now, and you wonder if everything you went through together, everything you did to each other, is just a distant memory for him.

You wish you'd told him you loved him. You wish you'd told him that he was your entire world, and that the time you spent together was the most incredible time of your life.

You wish you could make him know just how much he meant to you – still means to you.

But you're not sure if he'd even be interested. You wonder if he even remembers your name.

You wonder if it's all in your head.


	3. Chapter 3

_**So many thank yous for your reviews/follows/favourites. I love you all!**_

_**This is part three, and I've written it from both their perspectives – I hope it's not too confusing to follow, but it starts with Ste's POV and after each -s- thing it will switch from Ste to Brendan and back and forth etc.**_

_**This is the way I'm planning on writing the rest of the story, but please tell me if it makes following the story really difficult, and I will change it :)**_

_**Enjoy, and please let me know what you think ;)**_

**3**

You receive the invite in the post and you turn to Doug and you smile at him like an excited child. A proper celebrity wedding. You might be in the gossip mags and everything. Your husband smiles back at you, but there's a void behind his eyes, and you hate that he doesn't share your enthusiasm, or even notice how excited it has made you.

He's too busy worrying about his best man speech. He's been best friends with Riley Costello ever since he went to America for football camp when they were both 14, and he was Doug's best man, so it's only natural that he should return the favour. The only difference being that Riley is about to marry Mitzeee Minniver - wannabe WAG - and there's going to be over 500 people there. So you know he's feeling the pressure of holding that room.

You still can't wait to spot all the famous faces as they grace the room.

There's one face there you never expected, though.

-s-

Anne Minniver – Mitzeee, as the world (or the North West at least) know her – has been your closest friend for the past year. You let her use your club for a photo shoot, and you saw through her tough exterior when a dodgy photographer tried to exploit her for her more risqué pictures, and you stopped him. You look out for her. You see her vulnerability, and you find something inside of yourself that wants to protect her.

She loves your Irish accent and your tough exterior, but she sees through you too, and one night when you're drunk you tell her all about Steven, and she knows why you're hurting.

You find it only natural that she should invite you to her wedding. She's marrying a footballer, and it's going to be lavish, and _OK! _Magazine are going to cover it, and it sounds like it's going to be the worst day of your life.

You never expect it to turn out the way it does.

-s-

The ceremony's packed – you can't even see the bride as she walks down the aisle – and you're so far at the back that you can't hear what's being said. You thought with your husband as best man they might make sure you were kind of near the front, or at least had a good seat, but it looks as if those have been reserved for Riley's team mates and their celebrity girlfriends.

You're thankful at least that Riley and Mitzeee gave you an extra plus one – at Doug's request – as you figured you wouldn't be seeing much of him all day. So you have Amy with you, to keep you company. The kids weren't allowed – this was a children-free zone according to the bride – so the pair of you have a long overdue catch up without the children present. It's refreshing, and as you wait outside the ceremony you realise you're enjoying yourself with Amy.

You try to find Doug, but you can't see him through the throng of people in your way. You wonder if the magazine will want a picture of you – _The bride and groom with the best man, Douglas Carter-Hay and his husband, Steven – _but nobody's making an effort to find you, so you and Amy decide to slink off.

You realise you're drunk already, and you send Amy off to check what table you're sitting at whilst you fetch more drinks.

"You'll never guess who's on our table, Ste," you hear her call out as she approaches you.

She's about to fill in the details – and you can tell it's someone surprising by her raised eyebrows, and you hope for a reality TV star at the least – but she's interrupted when Doug catches your arm and pulls you into a chaste kiss.

He apologises for deserting you, and you tell him it's fine, because you've got Amy and you're having a laugh, and he asks you if you're drunk, and you say you might be a little bit, and he laughs warmly and tells you to behave yourself, because he's going to be sitting on the top table, and he's going to be miles away from you, and you wish him good luck for his speech and send him on his way.

You turn back to Amy, and she's on her way to the table already, and she's chatting away to someone you've never seen before. When you catch up with her you realise she's on the pull and she's had far too much wine to be anywhere close to successful but you're thankful to the stranger for humouring her, and he looks across at you with a knowing smirk as he agrees with her that salmon mousse just doesn't make any sense as a starter.

You find your name place, and you sit down and carry on listening to Amy as she embarrasses herself, and you don't stop her because it's a long time since she let her hair down like this, and you think it's hilarious.

-s-

You knew you recognised the best man from somewhere, only so out of context you hadn't made the connection. When you glance over the table plan on the way into the dining room, you make a point of checking the top table, in case you see a name you recognise, just so you can place him if you happen to be introduced to him at some point later in the day.

_Douglas Carter-Hay._

It takes a moment until it sinks in, and your world gets a little darker with the thought of it.

He's Steven's husband.

You hate him instantly.

You wonder if Steven's here, and a flicker of hope ignites inside of you, but you notice his name isn't next to Douglas, and you assume he isn't here.

You look for your own name, on one of the tables near the back, and then you see it. On the same table as you.

Steven.

_Steven Carter-Hay._

The addition to his surname makes you wince.

And yet your insides shudder with something resembling excitement.

You walk into the room, and you scan it for a few seconds before your eyes fall on him.

And _Jesus _if he's not still the most beautiful thing you've ever laid eyes on. You take a few moments to drink him in before you have to walk over to the table, before he knows you're looking.

He's still skinny – but maybe a little more toned than he used to be – and his expensive looking suit looks like it's tailored to fit him perfectly. Slim fit. It makes him look...refined. Handsome.

Irresistible.

Just how you remember him.

It makes the hairs on your arms prickle.

As you approach him you can make out his features, the angles of his face and the rise of his cheekbones. You're not close enough to see his eyes, but you hope his lashes are still as captivating as they always used to be, and you vow to make sure you get close enough to tell by the time the night is through.

You notice Sean – your date for the event – already sat at the table, and it looks as if he's being hit on by some unfortunate girl. As you get closer you realise who it is – Amy Barnes – and your skin prickles with the hatred you still harbour for the girl that tore the two of you apart.

Only it wasn't her fault. You know that, deep down, but you're always reluctant to admit you played any part in yours and Steven's downfall.

You approach the table, and you wait for him to notice you.

You sit down, and Steven's trying to calm Amy down, and then he's sharing a joke with the table behind, so he doesn't look at you straight away, and Sean's introducing you to the table. He looks at Amy when he says that he's your date. That you're here _with him, _as in, you're together. You know it's what you told him to say – that you've been seeing each other for months – but suddenly you don't want to lie anymore.

You don't want to lie to Steven.

Amy's face drops when Sean introduces a man as his date – she had spent the last half hour trying to chat him up, after all – and then turns to shock when she sees that it's you.

You forgot that your sexuality would be news to her. Steven had obviously remained tight lipped all these years.

You realise his loyalty was always one of the things you loved most about him.

Still love most about him.

You wait for him to turn towards you. Amy is tapping his arm as he's still chatting away to Riley's friends on the table behind, and you realise it's when she addresses you as Brendan, with a comment about how much things have changed since school, that she has his attention and he snaps back round and fixes his glare onto you.

You see the colour physically drain from his face. For a moment he stares, aghast, as he takes in the sight of you. You see his eyes tear away from yours for a pained second as he lets them travel down your body – or what he can see of it above the table – and he lets out a forced _Hi, _and the smile starts to form over his face.

You smile back, and you hope it comforts him. You don't want him to feel uncomfortable.

You do want him to feel something, though.

You're sure by the way that he's looking at you that he does.

You feel like you've been starved of him for far too long, and your heart is racing because you're sat face to face with the man you've been in love with for the past 8 years, and you have no idea if he knows how important he still is in your life.

You had no idea if he still cared. You hope the way he's looking at you right now means that he does.

He really does.

You smile at him, and he smiles back, and you let yourself believe you're sixteen again and that he's all yours, and you want it again more than your body can handle.

-s-

You can hardly tear you eyes away from him, and the only thing to pull you away from his gaze is the pain jabbing into your side, and you realise it's Amy trying to get your attention. You notice your starter is placed before you – you hadn't even realised you'd been served with it – you obviously had other things on your mind.

Like that fact that _he _is sat opposite you.

_Him._

Brendan Brady.

And when you look at him – when you let your eyes run over him for the first time in years – and when you gaze into his eyes – you feel everything you did all those years ago.

And you know it wasn't insignificant.

It was fireworks.

And you know you're in trouble.

"Can you believe it?" Amy whispers to you, and you'd forgotten she was there – you'd forgotten anyone existed for that moment.

"What?" you ask her.

"Brendan Brady," she whispers, mouth gaping open, "He's gay."

You almost laugh at it. Of course you'd never told her, you had kept his trust. But you figure you can tell her now. In fact, you feel as if you _need_ to tell someone – need someone to know exactly how significant he was in your life.

"I had an idea," you whisper back at her dryly, but she doesn't get your drift.

"Really?!" she asks you all surprised. "What, is that like your gaydar or something?" she continues.

You laugh again.

"Yeah, something like that," you tell her, but she's still looking at you blankly, so you can't help but explain, because you've kept it a secret for so many years, and it's such a huge part of your life. He's here with a man now, and he's clearly out of the closet, so you know telling Amy won't be betraying him.

"Or the fact I spent a year of my life fucking his brains out," you whisper to her crudely.

Her reaction is priceless, and you think you might have finally found the one thing that will leave Amy Barnes speechless.

You eat your starter in silence, and half way through she turns to you and stares you out, her face riddled with questions.

"I'll tell you later," you say to her. "When you're sober," you add, and she seems content with that. Even she can recognise she's too drunk to remember much of this in the morning, and that this is a conversation she will want to remember.

You muster enough courage to look over at him again when you've finished your starter.

He's staring straight back at you. Like he hadn't even looked away.

You can't help but smile at him. You know it's dangerous, because you know it's not just _any _smile you're giving him. It's _his _smile, the one you remember reserving just for him all those years ago.

He smiles straight back at you, and it's that knowing smirk that touches one side of his lips more than it does the other, and your stomach flips involuntarily.

You remember the things he used to do to your body.

You blush, and you have to look away from him.

You wonder if he knows that you don't want to.

The room is busy, and it's loud, and you're trying not to get too annoyed that you're too far away from him to be able to talk to him properly. You've been starved of him for too long, and it feels like agony that you're so close, and yet he's not quite close enough.

You spend every spare moment looking in his direction – stealing a glance at every opportunity – and it sets your heart alight when you see him looking back at you every time, his eyes full of promise. You can't look away from him – it hurts to tear you eyes away – so you don't. For minutes at a time, you eat you meal, and you talk to Amy, but your gaze doesn't leave his, and his doesn't leave yours.

You're still aching to talk to him, and the stolen glances aren't enough for you. You've got so many questions – so many things you need to know. You want to know what he's been up to, where he is with his life, when he came out. And who the hell is Sean? Did he come out to be with Sean? Did he do for him what he couldn't ever do for you? Your stomach lurches with the thought, and you're not sure you've ever hated anyone as much as you hate Sean right now.

You can't help noticing how he looks like you, though.

You want to know who Brendan's been with. It'll kill you to know, but you feel like you need to. You need to know where he's been. And you want to know that no-one's done for him what you did for him. Because nobody's come close to doing what he did for you.

You want to reach out to him, and you don't know if it's subconsciously or not, but when you finish your main course you stretch your feet out under the table. Your foot hits against someone else's, and you apologise openly to the table because you don't know who it was, but you realise it's him looking back at you, and he smiles and says that it's ok. As soon as you know it's him, you leave your foot there, and you flush moments later when you feel his foot gently graze against yours.

It's slight enough that if it was anyone other than him touching you, you wouldn't notice it.

But you do notice it.

Because it's _him._

And because it's igniting a fire within you that had never been truly extinguished.

You're served with dessert, and you realise it's crème brulee, and you look straight at him and you share a laugh together. You catch sight of Sean, Brendan's _date_ – the word making you shudder – and he's looking at you both with confusion, and a hint of unease.

"What's so funny," he asks, and you can detect the bitterness in his tone.

"Huh?" Brendan asks, and he looks like he's surprised to see him sitting there, as if he'd forgotten Sean even existed.

"You two," Sean explains to him suspiciously, "Laughing over dessert, all eyes across the table. Something I'm missing?"

Brendan looks over at you, and you smile at him, because there's so much that Sean's missing, and you're both so aware of that.

"We were at school together," Brendan explains simply.

"Oh yeah," you hear Sean say, "Good friends?" he asks.

"More than friends," Brendan tells him, and Sean's expression drops, and yours drops with it.

Brendan smiles at you, because he knows what he's just done.

He's just done what you would have handed over your life for him to do all those years ago. He's acknowledged you as something significant to him, and it makes your heart race in your chest.

And for that glorious moment, when you notice the flash of jealousy pass over Sean's face, you feel as if you're his again, and you feel proud of it.

You're suddenly aware that Brendan is flirting with you when he's sitting right beside his date, and it occurs to you that they might be an actual item, rather than just a wedding-plus-one arrangement. You need to find out.

"How long have you been together then?" you ask, trying to sound as nonchalant as you can muster, and you know Brendan can see right through it.

"A few months -" Sean starts, but Brendan puts his hand out to stop him talking.

"It's ok, Sean, I ain't gonna lie to Steven" Brendan starts, and turns to face you, as if he wants to make sure you understand what he's about to tell you. "It's our first date. We only met this week."

You smile, and you don't know why it causes a rush of excitement through you to know that Brendan's single.

Sean looks at Brendan all confused, and from the hushed words they're sharing you make out that Brendan had been the one to insist on Sean lying and making out they were a proper couple. You're sure it's your presence that's made Brendan do a 180, and you love that he couldn't lie to you; that he didn't even want to.

You feel a stab of realisation when there's an announcement that the speeches will start shortly. You'd almost forgotten about your husband in the haze of your memories with Brendan, and you try to ignore the shame you should be feeling with yourself.

You know it's always been the same with Brendan – you forget there's anybody else in the room – in your life - when he's here.

And now he's sitting right before you, you're not sure there's anything else you can care about.

-s-

You still love him.

He's taunting you with his secret smiles across the table and the way he's letting you brush your foot up against his under the table, and the way he's still _too _fucking beautiful for you to handle.

You'd give anything to make him yours again.

You hear Sean asking him how long him and Amy have been together, and you want to just call a taxi and put the lad in it and send him home because he's pissing you off now, and there's no need for him to be here now that you've told Steven the two of you are nothing.

You smile at your boy when he laughs at Sean's question, and tells him that they've got two kids together, a girl and a boy who are 9 and 7 years old respectively, but that he's gay. Your smile drops when he adds in that he's been married to the best man for four years, and you know he says it to add a touch of humour, and a laugh ripples around the table, but you know you're the only one not smiling.

You don't know if he notices, because you drop your gaze to the floor, but you pale at the thought of him with Douglas, and it tears through you. You're sure you can feel his eyes burning into the top of your head, but you don't look at him for a minute or so, because you don't want him to see the pain you can't hide from your eyes.

You feel him brush against your foot again under the table, as if it's some kind of apology, and you dare to look up at him.

His eyes fix onto yours, and they're taunting you, and he's smiling at you, and you don't know what he's trying to do to you.

It feels like his gaze is piercing you heart, splintering on it's way in because you know he can't do to you what his eyes seem to be promising.

You touch his foot with your own again, and you glare back at him, and you're trying to get an answer out of him – trying to find out what he's playing at. You wonder if he knows what his mere presence is doing to your insides – let alone the way he's looking at you – and you think he must be taking the piss or something, because his husband is in the same room so there's no way he could possibly be making a move on you in the way that his smile across the table and his foot underneath it would suggest.

You surmise it must be wishful thinking on your side. He's probably just trying to be civil with you, and you're taking it to mean more than you should.

As if right on cue, you hear the clink of polished silver against cut crystal glass and you hear the room around you quieten, a soft mumble at first before an almost-silence descends, and it's all eyes on the top table.

You watch Steven's expression drop as his attention is drawn to the top table, and his husband who is stood up alongside Anne's father and Riley.

You feel him snatch his foot away from yours under the table.

You smile slightly as it makes you realise that it had been there for the reason you'd hoped. The way that he can't keep his foot close to yours whilst his husband is in view must mean the few times he'd rubbed it slightly against your own weren't accidental.

You frown to yourself, though. It didn't make sense.

If Steven was happy – and he had everything he could ever want or need, so why wouldn't he be – then why was he...making the moves on you?

He has a husband, two beautiful kids, friends he'd had for life, a successful business.

Why would he jeopardise all that for you?

You try not to think too much into it as you sit through Anne's father's speech, nearly dozing off with the clichéd remarks about his beautiful daughter, the apple of his eye, and the roguish footballer who stole her heart, but who he's now come to love as his own son yada yada yada. You've heard it all before, and you suspect he's probably printed it off the internet.

He finishes soon enough, and you hear much of the same from Riley. You almost heave at the sickly sweetness of his words – how Anne is the love of his life – and think about how you've sat through so many groom's speeches in your time and scoffed at the stupidity of them gushing about how they've found _The One. _You always thought it was ridiculous, but you flinch when you catch sight of Steven in your peripheral vision, and the arrogance of your cynicism is washed away.

You realise you're still staring at the boy when everyone around you stands and toasts the bride. You look at the way Anne stares at Riley, and you feel an unfamiliar warmth in your stomach. You're happy for your friend – happy because despite it all, you know she truly loves him – and for the first time in your life you're not in pain watching a couple cement their love like this.

You're reluctant to admit to yourself that it might be Steven's presence making you soft all of a sudden.

Reality cripples you though when you see Douglas remaining as the last one standing. You glance subconsciously at Steven, and he's got a smile plastered on his face as Doug catches his eye across the room, and Steven nods at him, and you know it's some kind of encouragement, and it sickens you that the man who's holding the attention of the room right now is the same man that gets to have Steven for the rest of his life.

You're not sure you can watch.

Steven looks away from him when he speaks, though, and his gaze moves directly over to you.

He smiles at you sheepishly, and you're sure there's an apology in his expression somewhere, so you manage a smile back at him through the pain that's engulfing your insides..

You wince with the sound of Doug's voice – with the Americanisms he throws around in his natural idiosyncratic way. His speech is light and jovial enough to relax the room, but there's no way you'd call it impressive. It's weak, and wet, and completely predictable.

You stick around to begin with – interested in this man that Steven loves enough to commit his life to – and you're desperate to find something in him to explain why anyone would chose him above you.

There's nothing.

It angers you that he's got what you want – what you realise now that you long for with every fibre of your being – and his tiresome little display in front of this room is only causing your skin to prickle with more and more resentment.

You try to listen to him – try to appear as if his presence isn't killing you inside – and you try to keep your cool for the sake of the beautiful boy sitting across the table from you.

But Douglas says something – refers in his speech back to his own wedding day – and he looks over at Steven, and the whole room follows his gaze, and Steven forces the smile across his lips, and it's too much for you. You can feel your heart physically breaking all over again.

You excuse yourself quietly, and you sneak out of the door to the back of the room, through the lobby to the outside courtyard. You walk quickly over to a bench under a secluded tree, and you sit down and place your head in your hands, and you wonder how you're ever going to live after today.

You feel the tears stinging at your eyes, and you know you wouldn't recognise yourself if you saw yourself right now.

But you don't care, because no-one can see you out here, and you can allow yourself to feel the devastation that courses through you. You're not sure you could hold it in if you tried.

You think of Steven's beaming smile as he listened on proudly to his husband, and you think of the sickening feeling that coiled in your gut at the sight of it.

You'd slipped out of the room before you had chance to see Steven throwing a glance in your direction – his guilty expression that you'd had to hear his husband say those things to him – and his disappointment that you'd walked off and left him.

-s-

You're only half nervous on Doug's behalf when he steps up for his speech. There's too many other things spinning around your head to be able to fully concentrate on the thing your husband has been nervously planning for the past for weeks.

Like the fact that the real love of your life is sat less than ten feet away from you, and he's listening, and you know Doug is going to mention your wedding day in a few minutes time, and you can't bear to see how Brendan will react to that.

You fake the smile across your face when it happens, and you feel all the eyes in the room focus on you for a few seconds, and you feel a pang of guilt when all the women soften their expressions at you, and when Doug smiles at you over their heads. As soon as the focus shifts back to Doug, you glance at Brendan for reasons you haven't even worked out in your head, but you see that he's walking away, and you have to physically stop yourself from following him.

You can't exactly run out of the room after another man when there's 500 people who've just witnessed your husband express his love for you.

Most people would be satisfied with that. A public declaration of love.

You can't help thinking it's eight years too late and from totally the wrong person.

Your leg jitters up and down throughout the rest of Doug's speech, nervous apprehension running through you about where Brendan could have gone. You pray he hasn't left the wedding completely. There's so much you still need to talk to him about.

You half listen to the rest of your husband's speech – enough so that you can tell him he's done a good job; enough so that you can tell the room is smiling along with him warmly – and you're relieved that he's doing ok. It's not amazing – but it's nice enough, and it'll do.

It's like some twisted parallel for your marriage.

As he approaches the end – you know it's the last paragraph because you've heard it a dozen times as he's practised it over the last week – you lean in and tell Amy you're dashing straight to the loo when he's done.

You've barely finished toasting the happy couple, gulping down your champagne hurriedly, before you're leaving the safety of the table and sneaking out of the door you'd watched Brendan retreat through moments earlier.

You stop in the corridor for a second to make sure Amy hasn't followed you out, and when you're sure she hasn't, you walk out into the gardens to find him.

You spot him straight away, sat on a bench under a tree a few metres away, and you watch how he stubs out the cigarette he's smoking before taking out another straight away and lighting it.

Still chain smoking when something's troubling him - you remember how he always did that when you tried to pressure him to tell people about the two of you.

You smile, and you walk over to him slowly. He's got his head in his hands, but he hears you approaching, and he tries to plaster a look of indifference on his face.

"Hey," you start off nervously.

"Hey you," he says back as he looks up at you.

You sit next to him and he offers you a cigarette from the packet he's holding shakily in his hand. You haven't smoked in years – not since Doug asked you to quit – but you suddenly feel the need for that nicotine rush, for the dizziness you know it will send to your head because you haven't had one in so long, so you take one from him and stare at him as he holds his lighter up for you, and you lean in and take a drag as it ignites.

"Shouldn't you be listening to your husband's speech," Brendan mutters, and there's bitterness in there, and you can't help but feel a thrill at the thought of it.

It shows he cares. He cares enough to hate your husband.

"He's finished," you confirm, emotionless.

You are only referring to his speech, but Brendan's eyebrows raise and you know he's taken it more literally than you meant it.

You sit in silence for a few moments as you smoke your cigarette. There's so much swimming through your mind right now that you have no idea where to even start.

"Are you happy?" he asks you, and it's out of the blue, and he's looking at you like the answer to this question is all he needs to know.

You look back at him, and you can't lie to him. It's on the tip of your tongue to say yes – you know it's what you should say - but you know now that you're not. You were happy this morning – you had everything you could ever want – and you were happy up until a few hours ago.

But he's sitting before you now, and he's out, and he's single, and he's smiling at you like he used to, and you're married and it devastates you that nothing can happen between you.

"Are you?" you ask him back, because you can't face answering the question.

He laughs and looks away from you.

"I can't answer before you do," he mutters quietly, and you don't know what he means, so you ask him, and he's silent for so long that you think he's not going to answer you.

"I can't tell you if I'm happy, Steven," he starts, and the sound of your name in his accent again causes the hairs on the back of your neck to stand up on end. "I can't tell you, until I know that you are."

He looks at you, and you look back at him, and you know then. You know it wasn't all in your head.

And you know you still love him.

You don't say anything. You look at him, but the words you need just stick in your throat.

He stands up to leave, because the air is too thick between the pair of you, and you know it is, and you watch him walk away from you.

You know it's not over.


	4. Chapter 4

_**Thank you once again for your reviews you lovely people :)**_

_**And you can forget that I ever said this would be a three parter. I'm getting a little carried away with it...**_

_**This starts with Brendan's POV and will switch with each -s- like the last chapter.**_

**4**

You return back inside, because you don't trust yourself when you're alone and you're that close to him.

You know you've said too much already, and you desperately try to convince yourself that he won't have picked up on the meaning behind what you've just said to him, but you know it's futile. He might not have always been too quick on the uptake, but he's always understood _you – _he's always known what you're feeling before you do – and you know that you've just as good as told him that he's still important to you.

His silence had spoken volumes.

He isn't interested.

Well, why would he be? He has a husband who declares his love for him to a room of 500 strangers, and a life with him that's harmonious and perfect in every way.

How can you compete with that?

You return to your table, and you smile awkwardly at Amy as she regards you from across the table. You're not sure what to make of her expression – it's almost as if she's trying to piece things together in her head, and you wonder if she knows now about you and Steven. You saw them whispering earlier, and you wonder if he's told her.

Or maybe she's just had too much to drink.

You watch as Steven walks back into the room, and your chest constricts involuntarily, and you realise your heart is beating quicker, and you know it's the effect he has on you, and you realise you have no control over it.

He looks at you as he comes to sit at the table again, and you hold his gaze for a tortured moment, but you look away when you see Douglas approaching him.

They're close enough that you can almost hear their conversation, and you wince as you hear the press of lips coming together in a kiss. You try to concentrate on something else – try to focus your mind away from the whispered words between spouses, but you find nothing to occupy your mind.

You hear Doug asking Steven how his speech was, and he's telling him it was fine – great, even – and you hear him apologise for leaving Steven on his own all day. You don't make out his reply, and when Sean tries talking to you, you try to be grateful for the distraction.

"So," Sean asks as he leans in closer to you on the table. "Why'd you change the story?"

"What story?" you snap back at him, because despite yourself you're still trying to listen to Steven, and Sean is in the way. Again.

"The one you made me promise to stick to on the way here this morning," Sean explains. "You know, where we met through friends nearly three months ago, and we're keeping it casual but we've been seeing each other since then. What happened?"

You don't care what you say to him, and you don't care what he thinks of you. He's insignificant to you now.

"Steven happened," you tell him, and you turn to face him for the first time since he started talking to you, and you're sure you detect hurt in his eyes.

You can't find it in you to care.

"I can see that," Sean replies. "Although, he's looking pretty cosy there with his _husband,_" he exaggerates the word, all callous, "Maybe you should try and move on."

His words hit you harder than you let him know, and you brush it off by raising your eyebrows and taking a swig of your whiskey.

You're about to respond to him – about to give him a piece of your mind, because how dare he try to rile you up like this – but you're distracted by the sound of your own name, being said in a way you remember so well but haven't heard in years.

_Bren-dunnn._

You glance at Steven, and you realise in a split second that he's mentioned you to his husband, and it looks like he's about to introduce the two of you, and you can't handle it.

You stare at him, steely-eyed, and you hope he can see it in your eyes – can see you pleading with him not to do this.

You see him swallow down, and you notice that Doug's focus is turning towards you, and you can see a hint of an apology in Steven's eyes as he realises what's about to happen.

You want to run away, because you can't face Steven introducing his husband to you – don't want to hear him describe you as _'a friend from school' _when the two of you were so much more to each other.

You were everything to each other.

Doug's body jolts suddenly, and you realise he's being accosted by one of Riley's friends on the table behind, and he's being distracted and pulled away. You hear him apologising to Steven, telling him he will be back soon.

You hope he's lying.

You smile to Steven as he whispers _I'm sorry _across the table to you.

It warms your insides to think that he knows exactly what you're feeling – that you couldn't have handled shaking Doug's hand; couldn't have stood there and smiled at the man who gets to spend his life with Steven – and you drop your gaze before you let yourself get carried away.

The hotel staff come round and encourage you to move into the evening room, and you vow that by the time the night is through, you'll tell Steven how you feel.

You know he might hate you for it. You know he might run away from you. You know he might break your heart all over again with a few carefully selected words intended to soften the impact on your weary soul.

But you know none of that will hurt as much as this non-existence you've called your life since you let him walk away from you.

You need to do what you didn't have the guts to do years ago – and you need him to know that you're still here, if he wants you.

You need him to know that you love him.

-s-

Amy gets so drunk that you have to take her to bed before 8pm, and you're half-carrying half-directing her clumsily as you walk through the hotel lobby to head up to her room when Brendan appears and offers to help you. He takes her from you – grazing his hand across your forearm as he peels her away from your side - and carries her up the stairs like a hero. You pause a second in adoration, and then you follow them with her bag and shoes and the hotel room key.

When you've got her in bed with a glass of water and you can see she's breathing soundly in her sleep, you sigh and turn back to Brendan. He's poured himself a whiskey from the mini bar, and he's got another tumbler poured and is holding it out to you.

"For old time's sake?" he asks as you eye him suspiciously. Despite your recent affluence you can't help but resent paying mini bar prices, and you know it'll be you settling Amy's room bill in the morning.

"Go on then," you reply as you take the drink from him, clink glasses, and gulp back your first drop in years. The taste of it reminds you of kissing him straight away.

All those years gone by and it still hasn't left you.

You look up at him and he's watching you, a look of pure lust in his eyes, so you move to sit next to him so that he can't look at you like that any more, because you don't know how long you can hold it all together when he's looking up at you like you're his entire world.

Like he did back then.

"You remember it all, then?" you ask, and you don't know what it even means.

You've spent all these years wondering whether you meant anything to him at all – whether it was all just nothing more than a teenage crush – and yet the moment you met eyes with him earlier on it rid you of any doubts you'd had.

"How could I forget ye, Steven?" he asks rhetorically, turning to face you, and you know it would be only decent of him to finish that off with a laugh seeing as your husband is downstairs waiting for you.

But he doesn't, and instead the air is thick with everything that's left unsaid between the two of you.

You wonder if he remembers the last time you saw each other – how he'd fucked the life out of you in that alleyway and then left without saying a word.

You take down another sip of the whiskey, as if you are hiding behind it, but you hold his gaze like you don't want to let go. You don't know whether to give in to all the questions that have spun around your mind for the past 7 years and to get the answers you're desperate for, or if you should drop it and walk away.

You know there's no way you can do that.

He breaks the silence before you have the chance to break your own resolve.

"We had some good times, right?" he asks you, and it's as if he can't remember, or as if he thinks he remembers it being better than it was, and you understand it because it's how you think about it sometimes too.

But you know deep down it was every bit as incredible as you remember.

"You could say that," you say back, and you look up at him with a glint in your eye, and he laughs, and it's low and it's heavy in his throat, and you remember that laugh – you've never forgotten it – and you think you could jump his bones right there and then at the sound of it.

You smile at him, and you realise your heart is racing, and you can feel the glass in you hand and the hotness of your palm against it, and you shift in your seat and you know that it moves your knee closer to his, and you hope he takes it as a sign, because you know you can't make a full on move but you want him to know that you want it – that it might have been years, but nothing has changed.

You still want him, just as much as you ever did.

He still does incredible things to your body.

"You remember when we nearly got caught?" he asks, smiling.

"Which time?" you ask back in a flash, smiling, and he laughs, because he knows how close you both were and how many times you nearly gave someone an eyeful, and you remember so vividly how you'd always wondered whether you'd actually be able to stop if someone ever walked in on you.

You're sure he's having the same thought, and it sends a jolt through you, and you swallow down the lump in your throat.

"I reckon the closest was that time in the cinema," you start – tentatively, because you know it's dangerous – and he looks back at you with a vacant expression, like he doesn't remember – or he doesn't know which cinema trip you mean – so you add, "When that couple walked right past our row and I was -"

"Oh that time," he pipes up, interrupting to save you blushing, but you're enjoying it. You want to remember all of it, every time he made your body feel alive, and you know you shouldn't be talking to him about this but you know he's the only one that knows what really happened between the two of you. You've never had this opportunity to tell anyone how fucking risky the two of you were, never had the chance to speak out loud about it, and you realise now you've started that you don't want to stop.

"Wasn't as close as that time with Mr Reed," he reminds you, and he grimaces as he looks up at you and you laugh, that kind of laugh where you remember something shocking and you cringe with it at the same time.

"He actually opened up the door," you add, grinning through it.

"Good job he had his back to us -"

"You had me up the wall -"

"Didn't stop you though did it," he reminds you, and you smile at him like you wish it was yesterday. "Didn't stop either of us," he whispers under his breath as he looks down to the ground, and you have to physically restrain yourself from saying the wrong thing to him.

You're both so aware that nothing could ever stop the two of you when you were together.

Neither of you had ever wanted anything to.

You suddenly feel the weight of realisation as you think about where it all went wrong. You weren't wholly to blame – if he had been able to accept you out in the open, you wouldn't have felt the need to hurt him like you did – but you know what you did was unforgivable.

It would have killed you if he'd have done the same across you.

"For what it's worth, I really am sorry," you say eventually, almost at a whisper.

He stills, and he leaves it a moment before he looks up at you, and you can see the pain in his eyes, and you hope that he knows what you're apologising for. You hope he knows it means you're sorry that you fucked it all up. You're sorry that the two of you had something incredible, and you fucked it all up.

You'll never stop being sorry for that.

"Don't," he replies, and the word physically hurts you, and you know the depth of emotion that comes along with it.

He stares at you, and you can see that pain in his eyes, and you stare back at him, and you know it's been years since you've felt this kind of connection – this kind of searing heat between yourself and another person that makes all reason fly out of the window; makes you want to fuck the world and all the rules that come with it and be completely and utterly selfish for a few glorious moments.

It makes you want to throw yourself at Brendan's mercy and not care if you come out of it alive on the other side.

You hold his gaze for what feels like forever, and you know this is only heading one way. You can sense it – you know he's just as caught up in this as you are, and it's as if the rest of the world is just insignificant now the two of you have found each other again.

Amy stirs in her sleep and it breaks the moment the two of you have found yourselves in.

You almost curse at her – at the way she's come between the two of you again – and she hasn't even done it whilst conscious this time.

You try to hide your disappointment as he downs the rest of his whiskey and tells you the pair of you should head back to the party.

You're disappointed that he wants to get away from you.

It shows on your face – you can't help it.

"What's up, Steven?" he asks you, and you drop your gaze to the floor, because you can't tell him that you don't want to go downstairs.

You want to stay here with him, and you want to be alone with him, and you want to do everything to him that you did all those years ago, and you want him to make you whimper and beg in a way you haven't done in years.

You can't tell him all of that, because your husband is waiting downstairs for you, and you can tell that Brendan's just as aware of that as you are.

"Nothing," you lie as you finish your drink and stand up, and he watches you with lust-filled eyes, and he falters as if he is about to say something, to push you for more, but then he turns and walks away from you.

You glance at Amy and see she is sleeping soundly, so you follow him out of the room, and you watch him walk ahead of you down the stairs, and you hate yourself for noticing how he's bulked up nicely, and how his arse still looks incredible, and how you've never seen a man look so befitting of a suit like he is.

You catch up with him and you walk into the function room together, and you tell him you should go and find Doug, and he shrugs as if to say _do what you want, _but you can see the resentment in his eyes, and you walk away before you do anything stupid.

-s-

He walks away from you and you disappear to the bar, because fuck knows you need a drink after the conversation you've just had with him, and you didn't need the reminder of his husband's presence so soon after your own reminder of the life the two of you led in a lifetime that seems like a million years ago.

A life you wish with every bone of your body that you could lead again.

It hurts how much you want him. You've always known you weren't over him – always known you'd harbour a longing for him deep inside of you for the rest of your life. You've always doubted whether you would ever settle down with anyone else – it was him or nothing.

You just didn't think it was this bad.

And you thought you could keep it under control.

You go back into the room with your fresh whiskey, and the evening guests are arriving – you can see the flicker of paparazzi bulbs from the red carpet which has been rolled out on the lead up to the hotel entrance outside of the window you're standing next to.

You look across the room, and you catch Anne's eye as she's chatting with some botoxed ex-beauty queen, and she smiles at you, and mouths a question at you to check you're ok, and you nod back at her and smile gently, because how was she to know that she'd sat you on a table with the only man who'd ever stolen your heart.

The only one who'd also broken it beyond repair.

Your gaze travels around the room, and you realise that you can count on one hand the people you recognise in the flesh. There's plenty you've seen in your sisters magazines when she leaves them lying around your club, but you're all too aware that you're feeling a little insignificant amongst it all.

It's not something you're used to feeling.

You spot Sean sitting with a couple of others from your dinner table and you make your way across, despite knowing there's only one person you want to be with right now.

As you sit down with Sean your eyes are caught by Steven's on the other side of the room. He's with his husband, who is chatting away to him animatedly, and your heart breaks, because you know he's not yours anymore. He belongs to Douglas now.

But he's looking back at you, and the longer he holds your gaze, the more you can't help thinking that it still feels like he's yours.

Even after all this time.

You have to look away before your chest implodes on you with hope.

It's another hour or so, maybe more, and your mind feels numb with the idle small talk that's flitting around between yourself and the other nobody's you're sitting with.

And then you hear his voice, and you smile discreetly on one side of your mouth, and a chill runs through you.

"Wondered where you'd got to," he says, and he sits down next to you, and you turn towards him, because nobody else in the room matters now that he's chosen to come back to you.

"Ye miss me or something?" you ask him, with a glint in your eye.

He smiles, and it reminds you of the way he used to smile at you all those years ago, when he thought no-one was looking. The smile he reserved only for you.

"You wish," he responds, and he's trying to lighten the tension in the air between the two of you, but you can't help thinking that he has no idea how much you want him to have missed you.

And not just in the past couple of hours.

You're aware of Steven's attention being drawn to Sean, and you realise he's asking if the two of you are joining in on their drinking game.

Steven looks keen, but you feel like you're too old for that shit, and when you hear that it's I Have Never they're planning on playing, you ask Steven if he wants to join you at the bar instead.

"Don't you wanna play?" he asks, and he's smiling, and you know he's teasing. He must know it's not your thing.

"No," you answer him, deadpan, and it only makes his smile widen.

He must know he's the only person who can get away with talking to you like this.

"Come on, it'll be fun," he pushes, but you don't want to share him with anyone. If he's not with Douglas, and Amy's in bed, you know he'll stay with you, and you don't want to waste the time playing some drinking game with the guy you're supposed to be on a date with.

"I ain't playing," you tell him, and the rest of the group at the same time.

"Why not," Steven pushes, and you need to shut him up, and you know the only way to do it is to make him blush.

"Because I can't play this game with you, Steven," you say, and you're smiling, a glint in your eye as you continue. "Because there's not much I haven't done with you, Steven, and I don't feel like getting too drunk."

His mouth gapes open, and you're sure there's a few other surprised faces in the group, but you don't know for sure because you can't tear yourself away from Steven.

"Shut up," he teases back after a moment, and he pushes you playfully, and you know you've gotten away with it. "The bar it is then, I guess" he gives in, and you're vaguely aware of Sean mumbling something bitterly to the rest of the group as you walk away from him, but you don't register it, because it's not important to you.

What's important, is that Steven is here, and he's choosing to spend time with you, and you're both half way to being drunk and that's dangerous.

But you don't care about consequences.

You never did when he was around.

-s-

You're not even trying to hide it from him anymore. It's pointless.

You're so aware of Brendan's presence, and he's so aware of yours, and neither of you are oblivious to the current of electricity which passes between the pair of you, as it always has done.

You've got _history, _at the end of the day. You try to convince yourself – remind yourself – that _history _is all it should be, and how it should stay. But you know you've never been able to control yourself when it comes to Brendan Brady.

The voice inside your head tells you to be careful; that you should calm yourself down; that you shouldn't jeopardise everything you've got for the sake of a few nostalgic moments with the man stood before you.

And then the devil inside of you – you think it's your heart – is telling you to throw all caution to the wind. Because it's _him. _

It's always been him.

"What do you want?" he asks you, and you think it's too loaded a question for him to ask just out of the blue like that, but he's got the barman in front of him and you realise he's just buying you a drink, not making promises about a life you want with him so badly it hurts.

"Steven?" he asks again, and you realise you're stood like a lemon and he's still waiting for you to answer.

"Um. Lager, please," you say to the barman, and he nods as he starts to pour your pint.

Brendan's giving you a puzzled look, and you know you're acting a bit strange. You take a deep breath and try to calm the tidal wave of emotions flowing through you.

"So, why are you here?" you ask him, trying to make your words sound as natural as possible, as if you're not desperately trying to hide your racing heart from him.

He frowns back at you, so you elaborate by adding, "At the wedding?"

He raises his eyebrows as he takes a sip of his drink.

"Well, that's not very welcoming of you, Steven," he quips back, and he's smiling.

You roll your eyes and let out a quick laugh.

"That's not – you know what I mean," you say to him, and he's looking at you like he's playing with you. "How do you know Riley?"

"I don't," he answers, and you know he can see the confusion on your face. "I'm friends with Anne."

"Who's Anne?" you ask, no hint of embarrassment.

"The bride," he explains, sarcastically.

"Oh, Mitzeee," you realise and he smiles at you then. "I didn't think she'd be your kind of person," you admit, because you really can't see it. You don't know her that well, but from what you've seen in the papers, she seems like the opposite of Brendan's kind of person.

You briefly wonder if they've ever had a fling. Your insides lurch at the thought.

"Mitzeee isn't," Brendan explains to you. "Anne is. She's different when she's not trying to go all WAG on you."

You nod as you take a sip of your drink. You still don't understand – can't see the two of them as friends – but you can't let yourself get concerned about it because all you can think about is how close he's standing to you.

You're sat on a bar stool, and he's leaning on the bar next to you, and he's looking at you like nothing needs to be said anymore. You're melting under the heat of his stare, and you realise you're downing your drink, and you know it's because he's making you nervous.

You can't handle him standing this close to you. Not when it's taking every ounce of strength inside of you not to devour those lips that are staring back at you.

The one's you've never forgotten the taste of.

"So," he starts, and you're almost thankful to him for breaking the silence, until you hear the question he's about to ask. "You and Douglas. What's the story -"

You stop him mid-sentence by placing your palm up against his chest. His breath hitches at your touch, and you know it's dangerous, but you need him to stop that line of conversation.

"Let's not talk about him, yeah," you say quietly, and he faintly nods in agreement.

You don't want to hear your husband's name when you can feel Brendan's body this close to yours.

And now you can feel his heart beating against your palm.

You look up at him through your lashes, and you keep your hand where it is. You can feel his chest beneath your fingers, and you watch as he swallows down. He looks like he's losing whatever battle he's having inside of him, and you know yours is already lost.

You're still in love with him.

Still just as in love as ever.

And now you're sat here, and you're touching him, and you _want _him. You want him just like you always did.

"Steven," he says.

It's a warning. You look into his eyes, and you see your own thoughts reflected back at you. You're in a room full of people, and yet all you can see is Brendan; all you can hear is the sound of your heart in your chest as it beats – for Brendan.

Your hand is still flush against his chest – the chest which is heaving up and down rapidly with each breath.

He moves towards you. You're vaguely aware that the bar is getting busier, and that somebody is trying to get to the bar behind him, so he's moving out of their way.

But you know it's just an excuse.

An excuse to move his body closer to yours. He's almost standing between your legs now, and you can feel the brush of his thigh against the inside of your knee. You break out into an involuntary shiver, goosebumps prickling through your body at the sensation of his touch.

You're watching him, and you know he's feeling it too.

You look into his eyes, and they're pleading with you. Begging.

"Steven."

He says it again.

Only this time, it's less of a warning, and more of an admission. You can almost feel his resolve weakening.

You take your palm away from his chest, and you rest it against your knee. You can't resist trailing the tip of your finger against the back of his thigh, where it rests against you.

"Steven, don't," he whispers, and he's so close to you now, and you can tell how much it pains him to turn you away like this. "Please."

You know this is torture for him. It's torture for you too, but he has nothing to lose.

You've got everything to lose.

But so much more to gain.

You've finished your drink, so you tear your hand away from his leg, and you pick up his tumbler of whiskey from the bar, and you down it in one.

"Can we go somewhere?" you ask him, low and sultry and seductive as hell.

You don't care about the consequences. You're drunk enough to have numbed that part of you, and you're desperate enough to beg him if you need to.

He swallows again, and he looks at you, and you can see that his pupils are blown wide with lust, and you know that he wants this.

"Steven, no," he denies you as he grits his teeth, but you notice how his body edges slightly closer to you, and there's nobody behind him now forcing it.

"Brendan -" you start, but he cuts you off.

"No. Steven, don't," he says, and he drops his gaze to the floor, as if he can't physically look at you and turn you away at the same time.

You swallow down, and you glance around the room. Nobody is looking at you – nobody is aware of the indecency taking place in your exchange – and you inhale sharply when your gaze settles back on Brendan.

"We can just talk?" you say to him, because in that moment you don't care what you have to say to get him away from the eyes of the room – you'll say anything. You just need five minutes. Five minutes to finish the conversation you started in Amy's room. Five minutes to work out where you stand with each other. Five minutes to tell him how you feel about him.

And then possibly another thirty minutes to make up for lost time.

"Talk?" Brendan scoffs at you, but he's got a glint in his eye. "Yeah, because we were always so good at that, weren't we?" Brendan quips back, and you can vaguely see the smile in his expression again.

You smile back at him, and you know it's filthy. It's wholly inappropriate when Doug is the other side of that wall.

You think you're too drunk to process that right now.

You do notice how Brendan's eyes flick away from you though, and how they settle on something just behind you.

"Well this looks cosy."

You spin around on hearing a female voice, and you see Mitzeee stood before you.

She's looking at Brendan with a suggestive smirk on her face, like she's happy for him, but it drops when she glances in your direction and realises who you are.

She knows you – she was at your wedding, even if it was four years ago and she only came as Riley's date – but she knows who you are, and she knows you're married to Doug. You can see from her expression that she's not impressed with you, and she seems more than a little bit wary of your proximity to Brendan.

"You do know he's a married man, don't you Brendan," she smiles, making it into a joke, but you can both tell that she means it as a warning.

You can sense she's all too aware of Brendan's predatory nature.

And you can tell she's looking out for him too.

You think you start to realise what the two of them see in each other.

"Anne," Brendan smiles falsely as he looks at her, and she shoots him back just as plastic a grin. "You do know Steven then?" he asks her, and you're sure you're missing something about the way they're looking at each other.

"You mean Ste?" she asks innocently. "Doug's _husband,_" and she emphasises the word as she looks at Brendan, making sure he's fully aware of it.

She turns to you and smiles, and you wonder if there's a warning in there – it's a smile that says _I saw what you were up to before I came over -_ and you know she's suspicious of the two of you.

"I mean Steven," Brendan corrects her, and she spins round to face him again. "Who I went to school with."

You notice how her expression changes instantly. It's a mixture of shock and empathy which seems to leak from her now, and you don't know how your name could have elicited such a reaction.

"Steven?" she repeats, as if it carries some massive weight.

You don't like the way the two of them are looking at each other, and you feel like you're missing out on some joke the two of them have shared, at your expense.

"That's me!" you add in jovially, but you're only met with a half-hearted smile.

"Excuse us, Ste," Mitzeee tilts her head as she puts on her sweetest voice and smiles at you. "We'll be one moment."

You raise your eyebrows as she grabs Brendan's arms and pulls him away from you, Brendan looking back at you and shrugging apologetically as he's being dragged away.

You can't help thinking that you're missing something.

And then it dawns on you.

He's told Mitzeee about your past. She knows.

You're aware that the realisation should unsettle you – should make you panic about Doug finding out, or anyone for that matter – but it doesn't.

All you feel is a warmth blossoming through you. He's told someone about your past. And that means he cared enough to remember you.

You know you're drunk, and you know it's reckless, but there's one thing you know now more than anything.

You need to get yourself alone with him.

And it needs to be tonight.


	5. Chapter 5

_**I'm so sorry for keeping you waiting on this one, especially after you've been so unbelievably lovely with all of your reviews! My only excuse is lack of time after starting a new course, and a touch of writers block. Every time I sat down to write I sat staring at a blank page for ages! So I apologise if this chapter doesn't seem up to scratch. I hope it'll do :)**_

_**Again, thank you for your reviews. You will never know how much they mean to me!**_

**_This chapter flicks between Brendan and Steven's POV like the past few chapters, and starts off with Brendan._**

**_Enjoy :)_**

**_PS. To the lovely guest reviewer who asked - you don't know me as anything else, I'm just little old me, twenteseven! I'm the same name on tumblr, and I don't have a twitter xx_**

**5**

You're aware of what Anne's trying to do. She's talking – constantly – words at a hundred miles an hour in desperation to convince you _not_ to do this, not to go back there.

The cynic in you thinks she's probably just concerned that you'll do something to steal her thunder on her big day. She's probably scared that you'll try and whisk Steven away under the best man's nose and that _OK! _Magazine will be far more interested in that scandal than they are in her over-expensive nuptials.

But there's a realistic part of you that knows she's looking out for you, beneath it all.

You can hear her words but you don't register them. You know that she could give you a thousand reasons why you should walk away from Steven tonight, and it still wouldn't stop you. You've spent too long wondering how things could have been different. You've wasted too much of your life remembering how much you loved him.

Still love him.

He'd been so close to you just then in the bar. You'd felt his touch against you – the familiarity of his hands against your chest, even after all this time – and his eyes had pleaded with you in the way you still remember from your dreams. Or were they memories? You'd tried to resist, because despite it all, you know he's at a wedding with his husband, and you know that it's wrong for you to make a move on him.

But he'd been more than ready to make a move on you.

You know you wouldn't have taken much more convincing. You know you were close to giving in when Anne made her entrance. He's drunk, and you're not sure if he's acting like this _just_ because he's drunk, or if the alcohol is letting him say things he was too scared to say sober.

You hope it's _in vino veritas._

The sense you've always had for these kinds of things tells you that it is.

You make a point of remembering he was playing footsie with you under the table earlier in the day, _before_ he'd been completely at the mercy of the free flowing champagne. It supports your argument enough for you to rely on it.

Your attention is brought back into the room when Anne makes one of her many points with a slightly higher pitch than the rest. You can see that she's pacing, and you're surprised that she hasn't run out of things to say yet. You can tell she's realised that the _it's really not a good idea _argument isn't working on you, and she's moving on to the _he's moved on from you _train of thought, but you're not falling for it.

You've drunk enough whiskey tonight to let a little optimism spill through your usual self-deprecating demeanour, and you're still heady with the way he was just so close to you, and you let yourself believe for a few short moments that something could happen.

That you could be with him again.

That you could taste the sweetness of his lips and the saltiness of his post-coital sweat upon his body as you devour him with kisses in the aftermath.

That you could draw out that soft, sated, giggle from the depths of his hazy, orgasmic state.

That you could make him yours again.

You stand with your back to the wall, and you've been looking at the ceiling for the duration of Anne's talk with you so far, and you've been drowning out the sound of her voice with thoughts of what you could do with Steven's body, and you realise now that her incessant talking has stopped. You cock your head down and look in her direction, and see her standing, hand on hip, staring wide-eyed at you.

"Have you even been listening to me, Brendan?" she asks you haughtily.

You have to suppress the faint smile that's threatening to spread across your face – you're not quite sure what it is about Anne when she's trying to make a point, but you always find it amusing.

Which of course always makes her more annoyed at you.

"Of course you haven't," she sighs, defeated, as she turns to storm away from you.

"Anne, I was listening," you insist, and she stops and turns towards you to hear you out. "He's _married, _he's _over me, _he'll only break my heart _again, _it'll only end in tears yada yada yada. I heard ye, Anne."

You watch her eyes studying your face, and you know she's trying to read you, and you know that she's aware you aren't going to be swayed away from Steven that easily.

"Why do you still look like you're gonna run straight back to him when I let you go, then?" she asks.

You smile at her. You know she's trying to look out for you, and it warms your insides that you've got someone who cares about you – someone who isn't your sister and isn't bound to you by the DNA you share.

You think about what she's telling you. You know it makes sense – you know that on paper there would be no sense; no rhyme or reason behind what you want to do with Steven. You know there's a hundred – a thousand - reasons why you should walk away from him; why you should leave the party and leave the hotel tomorrow and go back to your sad little life and pretend you hadn't seen him again.

But there's one reason why you shouldn't do that. One reason why you _can't _do that.

It might only be one reason against a multitude of others; but it's the only one that matters.

You still love him.

His name should be ever imprinted on your heart with a warning; the shadow of the memory of the way that he shattered it into a million pieces should linger over it; shouldn't allow you to even contemplate doing what you're about to.

But it doesn't.

All your heart does when you think of him is beat faster. No warnings; no reminders of the pain. Just excitement, and warmth. And love.

You love him.

You hope it's not just the whiskey clouding your judgement.

"I can't let him walk away again, Anne," you say to her, because you're all too aware that she's still looking at you, waiting for an answer.

She takes in a deep breath. You think the honesty in your answer has unnerved her; surprised her. She knows you've never gotten over him. She's just never seen you so sentimental before – it's not a look you adopt often.

"What if he still walks away anyway?" she asks, and the thought of it makes you wince. "What if he really has moved on?"

"Then at least I fought for him," you say, and you swallow down the lump in your throat. Even you're surprised by your honesty. "What we had was fucked up, Anne, I know that. It was his fault as much as it was mine, and we both knew it. But that's my default setting, isn't it. Fucked up. It's what I do best."

You try not to be offended that she's nodding along with you unwittingly. You suppose you've given her enough reason to agree with you in the time that you've known her.

"But it's not over for me," you continue, "It's been years, and he's still in here," you add as you jab a finger to your chest. "You know it. And I can't let him just walk away again without telling him. If there's even a chance -"

"But what if there isn't?" she asks you, and you hadn't really considered it. You still don't. "What if he breaks your heart again -"

"He might do, Anne, I don't know," you cry out back at her, and your voice breaks half way through, and she blinks with what looks like shock at the way you've let yourself look weak in her presence; let your guard down like this. "I feel like he wants this," you continue quietly, your gaze dropping to the floor. "I gotta tell him," your voice trails off as you choke back the emotion you so desperately want to keep subdued inside of you.

You take a deep breath, and after a few moments to reflect on what's just happened – that you've actually managed to have a mature conversation about _feelings _with someone other than your sister – you see that Anne is moving towards you with her arms outstretched.

She takes you in her arms and you hug her back, and you notice how strange it feels to be hugging her in her wedding dress – it's so structured, and she's so covered up; it hardly feels like the same girl.

You smile when she tells you to be careful, and tells you that she'll support you whatever you decide to do, and that she will be there for you no matter what.

"Apart from the next two weeks, when I'll be holed up in a water villa in the Maldives with Riley on our honeymoon," she smiles as she pulls away from you. "I love ya, but I ain't leaving that bed for nobody," she smirks at you with a playful wink.

You shake your head and roll your eyes at her, and she laughs that wicked laugh that only she can get away with.

You couldn't be more thankful to have a friend like her; but you have a feeling you're going to prove her wrong.

-s-

You've been on high alert as you've sat at the bar waiting for him to come back. If you weren't so thankful for Mitzeee Minniver and her celebrity-fuelled wedding for allowing you to see Brendan again after all this time, you'd be seriously pissed off at her for dragging the man away from you.

It's not like she understands what happened between you anyway. Even if he'd told her – and you suspected he had by the way she'd just reacted – she'd still have no way of _understanding. _

Only yourself and Brendan will ever _understand._

You've ordered and finished almost two more drinks in the time since she took him away from you, and you've sat at the bar that whole time watching the door that they'd disappeared behind. You'd got the distinct impression Brendan hadn't wanted to walk away from you, but you're ready to pick up exactly where you'd dropped off when he's finished his pep talk with Mitzeee.

You're fully aware that the alcohol is making you loose. It's making you daring, and it's making everything seem simple. It's making you think that you can do what you want – that you can go with what your body is aching for – and you can give into Brendan without consequence.

It's making you think that there _won't_ be consequences; that nobody exists that could be hurt by your actions.

It's making you forget about Doug.

You frown as the thought of him hits you, whilst you're sat at the bar awaiting Brendan's return.

You realise your husband hasn't even crossed your mind in the time you've been sat there.

You down the rest of your drink to drown out any guilt that might be creeping in about the way you're so ready to drop him should Brendan give you the slightest whiff of an opportunity.

"Another, mate?" the barman asks you, and you consider it as you look across at him, but you shake your head in an negative as you pass your empty glass back to him.

You can recognise that you've had enough.

You know it's starting to cloud your judgement.

But you can't help thinking it's made everything so much clearer at the same time.

Your attention is drawn to a movement out of the corner of your eye, and you see that the door you've been watching like a hawk for the past fifteen minutes is opening, and Mitzeee is walking back out. She's heading straight in your direction.

You look behind her but you notice that Brendan doesn't follow, so you return your gaze to the bride, and you stand up to try to walk away before she can accost you. She looks like she means business.

She's too quick for you, and you're a bit wobbly when you jump down from the bar stool, and you curse yourself for having drunk so much.

You're desperate to know what Brendan has told her about you – about the two of you together – but when she stands before you and closes in on you, the words stick in your tongue and you remain silent.

She doesn't speak either. She stands before you, hands on hips, glaring intently into your eyes. You're sure she's trying to tell you something – a warning with her eyes, perhaps – and you suspect Brendan's told her everything. It would only be right of her to look at you with such disdain considering how it all looks on paper.

You don't know this girl – not well enough to know her mannerisms – but you suspect that she's itching to slap you, or shout at you, or do something to make herself feel better about the fact that you broke her friends heart. Even if it was all those years ago.

You know she can't make a scene though. It's her wedding, after all, and she can't spend three seconds out in this room without someone looking over and smiling at her, extending warm wishes, saving you from a stinging face at the hands of her palm.

You get the impression she wouldn't hesitate to slap you for what you did to Brendan all those years ago if she were anywhere other than her own wedding.

It feels like an eternity that she's standing there, staring at you intently with a warning in her eyes, but in reality it's merely seconds. Before you have a chance to ask her, she's being whisked away by one of her guests and is promising her second, third and fourth dances to a plethora of willing men.

You sigh as she walks away from you, and you laugh slightly with it too. You didn't know much about Mitzeee Minniver, but you've learnt a lot about her in the past few minutes – she's fierce, and playful, and she's stronger than you've previously given her credit for.

And above it all you can tell she's loyal. She's looking out for Brendan – she's protecting his interests, and you know all too well how difficult it is for Brendan to let someone else protect him.

You realise you like her already.

You've been distracted by her presence, and your attention has been drawn away from the door long enough that you could have missed Brendan walking out from behind it. You take a quick look around you, realise there's nobody around that you know, and you take a few slow, steady steps towards the door. You open it gently, but it's dark in there now, and when you flick on a light you see that Brendan isn't there any more. He must have ducked out whilst you were being intimidated by the bride.

You sigh, and you poke your head back into the bar and scan it, but he's not there. He's tall enough that you'd see him through the crowd – you know that from all the times you'd had to catch his eye in the middle of a crowded school dinner hall, back when you belonged to each other but hadn't told anybody else about it.

You realise only now how exciting the secrecy had been back then. It had been painful, sure, and agonising a lot of the time. But your relationship had never been short of excitement.

You head away from the bar and back into the function room, and you notice how things have changed slightly since you were last in there – the lighting is lower, softer; the music has slowed down and there's a four piece band on stage playing away gently; there's less groups sat around talking, and more couples swaying together on the dance floor. You pull your phone out of your pocket and check the time – it's almost 11pm – and you sigh in realisation that the night is nearly over.

You feel a pang of guilt knowing you should probably be in here looking for Doug at this stage of the evening, and instead your eyes are scanning the room for a certain moustachioed Irishman that you thought you'd never see again.

Your eyes settle on him through the crowd as the band come to the end of their gentle interpretation of an old Beatles' classic, and your heart starts to race again in double time.

He catches your stare, and he looks back at you with the same intensity.

He wants you – you're sure of it. You're so sure of it that you know if you crossed the dancefloor right now and closed your lips against his, he'd kiss you back with everything he had and then some.

You think about approaching him, and you're about to give in to the demands of your body when you see his gaze drops slightly, and seconds later you feel a warm pair of hands circling your waist, drawing you backwards

"I thought I'd lost you," you hear whispered into your ear, and you feel the wet suction of Doug's kiss as he pecks at your neck – at the spot he always goes straight for and which usually makes you smile with affection. Now you feel nothing, except guilt.

Your gaze stays on Brendan, but he's turned his back on you now. You close your eyes and sigh a deep breath, and you can almost feel the pain that Brendan's just felt at having watched Doug take hold of you like this.

You resent Doug for having made him feel like that.

You're only slightly aware of how ridiculous that is – aware that your loyalty should lie with your husband, no matter what – and you wonder if this is the moment your marriage falls apart.

You swallow that thought, and turn into Doug's embrace, and try to ignore about the turmoil raging through you.

You try to be as normal as possible.

"You having fun?" he asks you as he kisses your lips, and you try to kiss him back, but it feels _wrong. _

It feel likes you're cheating.

Only it's Brendan that's at the forefront of your mind; not your husband.

"Yeah," you tell him, and you force the smile out of you. "Had to take Ames to bed, she was well drunk," you add in an effort to sound as normal as possible.

He laughs at you, and drags his hands from around your waist, bringing them up until they're locked behind your neck. You feel him starting to sway to the music, and you realise he's trying to dance with you.

You give in to it, because you can't refuse to dance with your own husband, but the thought of Brendan watching you from the side of the dancefloor resonates through you.

"You had a good day?" Doug asks, and you smile and nod at him.

"Yeah, perfect," you tell him.

You fleetingly think about the truth behind your words. If Brendan hadn't been there today, you really would have had the perfect day – you'd had fun with Amy; you'd spotted some celebs; and Doug had been nothing short of the perfect, doting husband for most of the day.

And yet, it was the moment that you'd set eyes on Brendan across the table that everything had changed for you.

It had finally seemed as if _perfection _in your life was suddenly possible again.

You just need Brendan in it.

"What are you thinking about?" Doug asks as you dance with him, and the question throws you off course.

"Eh?" you ask him, frowning.

You're trying to buy time, because you can't tell him that you were thinking about how the best part of your day had been falling back in love with the man who'd never truly left your heart.

"You were frowning, looked like you were thinking about something serious," Doug explains, and you curse yourself for being so terrible at hiding your emotions.

It's a trait you'd always suffered with, and one that had taught you how to lie your way out of a difficult situation.

"Just thinking how the kids would have loved all this, celebrity spotting and everything," you tell him, and he accepts it as a reasonable explanation.

"They'd have been bored," he tells you with a smile, and you smile back at him, and you pull him into a hug as you breathe a sigh of relief that he hadn't caught on to your deception.

You know you'll need to tell him soon enough, and you will when the time's right; but this isn't it.

You're still swaying on the dancefloor with Doug, and you've rotated enough now so that you can see the spot where Brendan was standing over Doug's shoulder. He's not there any more, and your eyes scan the room for him once again.

You're shocked to see he's on the dancefloor too now.

He's got one arm around Mitzeee's waist and the other is holding her hand. He's a surprisingly good dancer, and you half-smirk, half-frown at the sight of it. She's laughing, and you know it makes no sense but you feel a pang of jealousy towards her.

You'd give anything to be the one in Brendan's arms right now; to be the one that he's making laugh like that.

As if he can sense you looking, his eyes glance up and meet yours.

You feel a shiver run down your spine, and you try to mask the involuntary reaction in your body at the intensity of his gaze.

His eyes don't leave yours for the duration of the song.

It makes your knees feel weak to know you've captured his attention like this.

You bite your lip, and you notice the flicker of his gaze as it dips to your mouth, and you know exactly what you're doing to him. You wanthim to want you again, and you haven't forgotten how he used to love biting on your bottom lip – how he told you he hated to watch you do it because that lip belonged to him, and he was the only one allowed to bite on it like that.

You wonder if he remembers it like you do, and as his eyes lock back onto yours, you're left with little doubt that he does.

Your thoughts become wholly inappropriate, and you feel yourself starting to harden against Doug's leg.

You know you need to try to control yourself.

But you have no idea how to even try.

-s-

He's testing every ounce of will power you posses.

He's so _fucking _beautiful, and you know that's not his fault, but it doesn't make it any easier for you to deal with the fact that you want him more than you've ever wanted another man, but he's stood before you swaying with his husband.

And yet he's looking at you like he's dancing just for you.

He's testing everything you've got.

You're torn; you feel like you can't watch it, can't stand on the sidelines and watch as his arms circle another man's neck, as he stands chest touching chest with him, his breath hot against Douglas' skin. And yet you can't possibly walk away from him; can't break the connection his eyes have with yours; can't help the feeling that he's feeling closer to you in that moment than he ever could be with the man he's dancing with.

You just can't shake the feeling. It feels like he's still yours; like his eyes are relaying a message that he can't quite speak out loud to you.

He's biting down on his lip, and your mind flashes back to the moment all those years ago when you had him in your bed because your Dad was out of town and your sister was still at the park with her friends, and he was stark bollock naked save for one sock on his left foot, and you'd just fucked the life out of him, and he'd screamed your name like he'd never get tired of you, and he was sated and exhausted from it all, and so were you, but he'd bitten his lip much the same as he's doing to you now, and you'd leant up and pulled him closer to you and devoured him all over again.

Afterwards, he'd told you how he was impressed you'd been so ready to go again so soon after the first time, and you made the mistake of telling him that you can't resist him when he bites down on his lip like he had done, because that lip belonged to you, and only you were allowed to bite on it like he'd been doing. And from that moment on, he made a habit of doing it on purpose in the most unsuitable of places. Across the dinner hall at school; when he grazed past you in the middle of an exam as he left to go to the toilet; when you were being dragged around the shopping centre with your sister and he spotted you in the McDonalds queue.

He knew exactly what to do to get you aching for him. You'd made the mistake of telling him; and he's never made the mistake of forgetting how to play you.

You hope to the depths of your heart that he's doing it on purpose now, for the same reasons he always used to.

Because he wants you.

"Erm...Am I missing something?" you hear whispered into your ear.

You realise it's Anne – you're still dancing with her, swaying softly to the beat of some romantic sounding tune you've never heard of – and she's stopped dancing as she pulls away from you.

You match her gaze, and she's smirking at you, and her eyes glance down towards your crotch, and you realise then what she's talking about. You're hard, and you laugh as Anne laughs with you, and you glance over at Steven, and she follows your gaze.

Her smile drops as she reads your thoughts like a psychic.

"Be careful," she warns softly, and goes to place her hand on your shoulder again to continue your dance.

"I will," you assure her with a whisper, and you can feel it then – the length of your erection pressed against her. You're not sure you've ever felt more uncomfortable in her presence, although you know she's more than aware that it's not for her benefit.

"I'm sorry," she laughs, and steps backwards, "I can't dance with _that_!"

She doesn't walk away from you though, and the pair of you laugh together in the middle of the dancefloor like you're the only two people in the room.

You glance over to Steven for a second, and the smile falls from your face.

It's just a split second; the quickest, least intimate kiss you've ever seen, but you feel sick to the stomach as you watch Steven's lips – _your lips –_ connect with Douglas'.

You can't do it. Can't stand here and watch it for a single second longer. Can't stay in the room and breathe the same air as the man who's keeping Steven away from you.

You feel the walls closing in on you, and your head feels dizzy all of a sudden. Noise in the room doesn't sound like you know it should; everything's dimmed, blurred, echoing around you. You try to breathe, try to inhale the air that your body's crying out for, but it suddenly feels like you can't take in enough air, and you start to panic, and you feel like you might die if you stay in the heat of this room for a second longer. You're not aware of making the decision to leave, but your legs are carrying you quickly, shoulders barging against other people as they dance away regardless of the way your world is crashing down around you. You vaguely hear protestations from some of the people who've gotten in your way – but you don't care; you can't stop to apologise to them.

All you can hear is the _thud thud thud _of your heart as it beats against the restriction of your chest, and the sound your own feet make as they hit purposefully against the floor, taking you to your escape.

You feel the fresh air hit your face, and you walk a few metres away from the door – away from the small crowd of smokers that have congregated around the ashtray – and you find a spot of your own where you can rest against the wall.

You lean back against the wall and get your breath back; feel your senses returning to normal as you bend forwards and lean your outstretched arms against your bent knees, head hanging between your shoulders like a man defeated.

You feel ridiculous for having let yourself get carried away with the idea of Steven coming back to you. Seeing him with his husband just confirmed it for you – he doesn't belong to you any more.

You know deep down that he never really loved you.

Steven is better than you – always has been – and you curse the part of you that ever thought he'd give everything up for you.

He might have given you the eye earlier on – might have let himself get close enough to touch you - but you remind yourself that he's drunk, and he isn't thinking straight, and you know you've got no chance of having anything resembling a life with him.

It breaks your heart all over again; only this time it feels worse – because you know what life without him looks like now, and you'd give anything to never experience that again.

You stand up straight and take a cigarette from the packet inside your jacket pocket, and you light it with a match and feel the nicotine wash away the pain that's coursing through your insides.

It floods your senses, like it always does; but this time it isn't enough. It will never be enough.

You take in drag after drag, sucking in as much as you can, desperate for the release the chemicals usually give you. You realise that this time it's no good.

You wonder if you'll ever get over the pain of not having Steven in your life.

You finish the cigarette and light another straight away. You've nearly got through a full pack of 20 today, what with your meltdown after Douglas' speech earlier, and now this – that's twice your usual amount.

You think about giving up on it all. You think about calling it a day – going back inside and grabbing Sean and taking him to your room and using him to work out every ounce of your devastation long into the night.

You almost feel sick at the thought of it.

But it's better than going back to your room alone and spending the night resisting the tears you so desperately want to let fall for the sake of the beautiful boy inside that room who's never let anyone else get close to you.

You straighten up, extinguishing your third successive cigarette, and you take a deep breath as your raise your head.

"Brendan," you hear, and your heart lurches into your throat.

You look at him, and you've been so far through the mill over this boy in the past few hours that you literally don't know what to say to him.

"Steven," you reply.

It's a start.

-s-

You stood on that dancefloor, and you couldn't tear your eyes away from him even if you'd have tried.

You don't think he even minded that you were stood dancing with Doug as you did so. Well. You're sure he did mind – this is Brendan, after all. Jealousy doesn't even come close to explaining the core of that man.

But you hope he knows that you're thinking of him with every beat of your heart now. You hope that he reads in your eyes what you're trying to portray. You hope that he sees the way you're biting your lip, and you're sure you see that it's having the same effect on him as it always used to.

You know how to play him – how to turn him on from the other side of the room. You've never forgotten Brendan Brady and his kinks.

Every single one of them.

You see Anne whisper to him, and his attention falls from you for a second. They're laughing about something, and you smile to yourself. You feel as if you've had a secret insight into the unknown world of Anne Minniver by watching how she is around Brendan – you realise she's not as WAG-like as she's made out in the magazines. She might have a heart after all.

You feel Doug pull you closer, and it reminds you of his presence.

You wince, because you'd do anything for him to get out of this unscathed, but you're really not sure there's a genuine chance of that happening.

Not now that Brendan's involved.

Doug pulls away from your chest to look at you, and you force a smile across your face.

"You tired?" he asks, and you shake your head.

You haven't even thought about ending the night. There's so much you need to get through before you can even think about sleeping, and yet you should have assumed that Doug would be thinking about turning in. Even though it's his best friends wedding; even though he's the best man; even though it's a celebrity bash with an open bar and the DJ playing through until 3am. He's still thinking about going to bed at just gone 11pm.

You grit your teeth as you realise now is no time to bring up Doug's imperfections.

You've spent all day lusting after another man, and yet you're standing here picking faults with your almost faultless husband.

You lean in and place a kiss against his lips.

It does nothing for you.

You kiss him again, and you know that you're trying to find something.

You want to find a reason not to walk away from him and drag Brendan up to your room.

You don't find one.

You glance in the Irishman's direction, but he's gone. Anne is stood alone, staring out into the room and when you follow her gaze, you see Brendan retreating through the crowd on the dancefloor, leaving a trail of disgruntled guests in his wake.

You feel the inexplicable urge to follow him.

"I'm going out for some air, Doug," you say to your husband as you break out of his hold and start to walk away from him.

"Oh, ok," he says to you, and you can tell he's confused as to your sudden change in behaviour.

"I'll come and find you in a bit, ok?" you tell him, and you're already walking away from him when he nods in confused agreement.

You smile at him, and you turn and follow Brendan's path.

You're not sure where he's gone, so you frantically check in the bar area and the lobby and reception area. You see no sign of him, and you hope he hasn't gone up to his room.

Not without you, anyway.

You wonder what made him bolt so quickly.

You think you know why, but you don't want to be too presumptuous to think that the sight of you kissing Doug would have had such an effect on him.

You hear a few party-goers open the door behind you as they walk in from the smoking area, and you turn on your heels to run outside.

You look left and right, and focus on each of the faces stood out there. It's dark, and it's not very well lit outside, and you have to study each face to see if it's him.

You don't see him anywhere.

Not at first.

Then you spot a lonely figure stood resting against the wall a few metres away, and you know without really seeing him that it's Brendan. You can tell from the way he holds himself; from his mannerisms as he leans against the wall.

You walk away from the group by the door, and head towards him. He's hidden out here, away from view.

It's almost the privacy you were begging for a short while ago.

"Brendan," you say you him, because you have no idea what else to say.

He looks startled, and then he sees you, and his features soften instinctively when his eyes rest on yours.

"Steven," he says, and you know it's because he doesn't know what to say either.

You walk over to him, and you lean against the wall next to him. Your arm touches his, and you take a deep breath as you stand this close to him, and you know he feels it too.

You stand there in each other's silence for a few moments, and then he takes the cigarette pack from his pocket and offers you one. You take it without speaking, and you inhale the nicotine as he holds up a match to light it for you, then lights his own with the same match.

You've nearly finishing smoking it by the time he breaks the silence.

"What ye doing here, Steven?" he asks you, and you can't help but notice the break in his voice as he questions you.

You take a deep breath, and you push away from the wall, and you drop the remains of your cigarette to the floor and extinguish it with your shoe.

When you dare to raise your gaze to meet his, your heart lurches in to your throat.

You have no idea how to answer his question.

And yet you know that you don't need to. The way he's looking back at you – the way his eyes read yours just as well as they ever did – you know he's all too aware of why you've followed him out here.

"I don't..." you try, but the words stick in your throat. _I don't know. _You feel like your mind isn't working the way it should – it's cloudy, and it's foggy, and there's only one thing you can focus on amongst the chaos.

And that's Brendan.

"I still...I..." _still love you. _You try, but the words don't leave you.

Suddenly he's not waiting for an answer from you anymore, though.

He's pulling himself away from the wall, and he's taking the one and only step towards you that he needs to. His chest is almost flush against yours, and you can feel the heat from his body warming against your own.

He holds your gaze, and you see him swallow down, and you feel like you have no control of yourself as he trails a finger up your torso, and stops right above your heart.

"You still feel it?" he asks you, and his voice is low, and smooth, and sexy; and you can almost taste him, he's that close.

You bring your face closer to his, and you shuffle your feet forwards the last remaining inch, and you take in a sharp breath when you feel the solidity of his body against your own, and you smell the whiskey on his breath, and you see his pupils blown wide with lust for you.

You can't speak. You can't answer him, can't physically focus your mind enough to make your mouth form sounds into words. You're completely blind-sighted by the proximity of his lips to your own.

You're holding his gaze, and you flick your eyes between his lips and his eyes, and you don't let yourself even think about it when you snake your hand behind his neck, fingers raking through the short hairs the back of his neck, and you bring his lips to meet your own.

He lets out a groan of pure carnal need when you swipe your tongue against his bottom lip, and he devours you, and you feel as if you've come alive for the first time in years.

Your body feels weak with the headiness of his lips on yours, and you lean against him for support as you continue to kiss him, breathing out his name on your lips when he parts for air; only he's weakened by your touch as well, and the two of you fall against the wall of the hotel, and you pin his body between your own and the hard brick with more strength than you knew you could possess.

You grind your groin against his, and you whimper when you feel the strength of his erection against your own, and he's telling you that he wants you, and he's never stopped wanting you.

It's everything you've been waiting to hear for the past eight years.

And as you continue to kiss him with all the want and need and obsession you have festering inside of you, you can't push away the nagging feeling coiling in the pit of your stomach, telling you that your life will never be the same again.


	6. Chapter 6

_**For the benefit of anyone who hasn't seen my tumblr, I'm sorry for the delay but don't worry my love for Stendan and my urge to write about them doing naughty things to each other hasn't been dampened by Stug on screen – I've actually been in hospital with viral meningitis and I've had no internet connection :( But I'm out now, so here's a (slightly shorter than usual) update for you patient people who are still with me! **_

_**Your reviews have put a massive smile on my little poorly face :D Thank you, I love you all xxx**_

_**PS This starts with Brendan's POV and switches with each -s- again.**_

**6**

You have no words to describe the sensation that's pulsing through you. You feel the soft pressure of Steven's lips as they meet against your own and it feels like you're drowning under the weight of it; of the memories of the two of you and the years of tortured anguish as you'd prayed for him to come back to you.

You're not a thoughts and feelings kind of man, but even you can't believe this is actually happening.

You feel a tingle rush through your tongue each time it slides against his; can taste the lager and tobacco on his breath; can feel the warmth of his hands as they drop from around your neck and slide around your waist inside your suit jacket. You groan as the thought of his hands warms through you – that you know what those hands can do, that you want them to do it right now. All of it.

He laughs against your mouth, and you think he's laughing _at_ you for a moment – think this is all some joke at your expense, that he's going to pull away and tell you how ridiculous you are for hoping that it could go anywhere because _fuck _it feels to good to be true right now.

You still with the thought of it, but he doesn't move away like you think he will – he bites down on your bottom lip then kisses it better, pushes himself up against you with a new vigour and your back hits the wall, and you realise it's because your knees are weak under the influence of his proximity to you right now.

He laughs again, seems pleased with himself for what he's reduced you into, and you feel your knee shaking as he pushes himself into you, and you feel his hardness grinding into you, and you groan with the _fucking feelings _he's stirring up inside of you.

"I want you," you tell him, whisper it into his mouth as he steals your breath with his kisses.

You _need _him to know – have needed to tell him for so long. Your memory of him is a haze of what actually happened mixed in with your doubts and insecurities, add a touch of things you wished you'd said to him and in the midst of it all you're not sure that he ever really knew.

And you need him to know.

"I never stopped," you tell him again. "I never stopped wanting you, Steven."

He grunts at you and the pace of his tongue quickens, and you know that he's hearing you.

"I'll always want you, Steven, don't ever doubt it."

Your words are muffled slightly by the force of his lips against yours, and then you feel the harshness of fresh air against your moistened lips, and you realise he's pulled away from you.

You open your eyes, and your senses fade back in gradually, and you see his beaming smile – but he isn't looking at you.

You hear a bang, and you look up, and you see what he's seeing.

Fireworks.

He snakes his hand around your waist, and you look down at him and smile, and he smiles back at you.

You start to hear voices as the wedding party appears at the doors on their way out to watch the fireworks, and without a seconds thought you grab his waist and move him the short distance around the corner and out of sight of the quickly assembling crowd.

It's darker around here – you're in a slight recess now between two of the hotel buildings, and nobody can see you here – and he glows under the watchful eye of the moon.

You look down at Steven, and he's smiling blindly up at you, eyes glazed over with a dizzy apprehension about what's happening, and you wonder if he's feeling the same uncertainty you are.

His face illuminates white then pink, and you hear another firework go off. You smile at him on one corner of your mouth, wrap your arm around his shoulder, and turn to watch the fireworks.

This could be a scene from some Hollywood movie.

Only it's not.

It's you and Steven.

The love of your life.

It's as close to perfect as life has ever been for you.

And yet you're still having to hide around the corner away from the prying eyes of his _husband_.

You push the thought from your mind as you feel his arm around your waist, and he squeezes you, and you know you've got him now.

They're they best damned fireworks you've ever seen.

-s-

You still love him – just as much as you ever did.

You know it – can't even try to deny it when he's holding you like he's going to protect you forever in those strong, muscular arms of his. You feel weak with the sense of it; memories of the way he used to make you feel swarming through your senses, and it takes every ounce of strength you've got not to rip his clothes off right here and now.

You try to remember what it was you loved most about him. What you _still _love most about him.

The sex was incredible. Mind-blowing, out-of-this-world, electrifying, and every other cliché you can think of to go alongside it. He always knew exactly how to work you – that one kiss to the spot where your neck meets you shoulder will make you just crumble after an argument; that his soft lips and gentle teeth on your nipples makes you harden instantly; that when you're angry you need to be fucked like it's a punishment and when you're drunk you like him to tease you then push into you slowly and intimately.

He knows all of that.

And you suspect he might never have forgotten.

...you hope not, anyway.

But it was never _just _sex with Brendan. You might have both pretended it was – might have both let your awkward teenage thoughts box up what you had and label it as something cruder than you both knew it was. But it was so much more than sex.

It was about _knowing _each other; _understanding _what and who the two of you were and still coming back to each other regardless. It was about him seeing you in a way that you didn't let anyone else see you, and him the same with you, because he didn't scare you – you didn't scare each other. He might have had a feared reputation around school, and he might have been the resident bad boy as far as everyone else knew – but with you, he was just Brendan. _Your _Brendan.

And when you'd caught his eye across the dinner hall, and he'd been throwing his weight around in an attempt to establish his authority, you remember how you'd smirked at him, and he'd smiled back at you, because you both understood.

You remember how you'd teased him about it later that night after he'd fucked you mercilessly, and he'd seemed surprised how you'd worked him out so easily, but he'd laughed, and he'd kissed you slowly, and then he'd made love to you, like you'd both reached some level of understanding that had brought you closer together. And every time since then had been different – closer; more connected.

You thought you'd crumble if he ever left you.

You almost died when he finally did.

You look up at him now and he's staring at you, and his eyes are so full of warmth and lust and – dare you even think it – _love, _that you think you might dissolve at the sight of it_. _You smile at him, but you don't have a chance to smile fully before he's catching your lips in another passionate kiss, and it feels like heaven on earth.

You move your body around so that your chest is flush against his again, and you slide your tongue inside his welcoming mouth, and you can feel his smile against your lips, and you laugh with the heady excitement of it all.

You can hear voices so close by, but you don't care. You don't recognise any of them, and you know you're both hidden from view where you are here, and if you're honest with yourself you don't even care if someone finds you because you're here with _Brendan _again, and it's so hard for you to see anything else as significant when you're attached to him like you are now.

You kiss him with a renewed sense of vigour, and you push your groin against him, and you know you haven't been this hard in forever. You hear him responding to you with a groan of pleasure, and you feel his body sparking into life – his hardened length rubbing achingly against your own; his hands up and down your back and grabbing onto your arse with a new sense of urgency; his lips pressing against yours and then remembering the path down to your jaw and along your neck that has your knees buckling beneath you.

You feel alive with it; feel awakened as if you'd been asleep for years, as if you haven't been turned on like this in a long time. You know it's the effect he has on you – the effect he has always had on you – and you know you won't be satisfied with just this alone. The thought of Doug is as far back in your mind as you can push it, and you're not sure if it's you not thinking straight, or if you're actually making more sense than you have done in a long while when you whisper into his kiss,

"I want you."

He stills at the sound of those words spilling from you, and he pulls away from you, and for a slight second you think it's all a dream and you've woken up; or that he's come to his senses and remembered how much you hurt him all those years ago and how he can't ever forgive you for it.

But he doesn't pull away.

He smiles at you.

And it's a smile that holds a thousand promises – promises of the kind that you _know_ he can follow through with; that you _know _he won't ever break to you, or to your body.

"Brendan," you start, and his kiss steals the words from your mouth for a slight second.

You laugh, louder than you should, and the voices you can hear faintly around the corner stop at the sound of it, and Brendan looks towards them for a moment with an eyebrow raised.

You wait a second, but nobody appears, and he turns back towards you with a smirk and a glint in his eye.

"Careful, Steven," he warns you playfully.

You laugh again, quieter this time, and you place a gentle, lingering kiss against his lips.

"Brendan," you whisper as you pull away, "Where can we go?"

You look up at him, waiting for his reply, and he looks down at you with a mixture of trepidation and unease.

"Steven, you shouldn't -"

"Stop thinking, Brendan," you beg him, because you know what he's about to say, and you don't need to be reminded of it. You can't see straight when you're with him – it's always been the same – and you know deep down what you're asking of him is _wrong, _but you've already forgotten about the world outside of his embrace and you're not ready to let it back in yet.

The problem is – as it always has been – that you can't see _anything _at all when you're not with him. And you've had far too many years of nothingness now.

You can't pass up on this.

"Where can we go?" you ask him again, and he exhales sharply and lets himself fall back against the wall.

He looks at you for a moment, and an unfamiliar panic starts to build up inside of you, and for an excruciating moment you think he's going to do what he's never done to you before – turn you down.

His eyes meet yours again, and you plead with him, placing another kiss against his lips, and you feel him responding to you, and you're sure he can't say no.

"Ok," he smiles as he pulls away from you, and you smile back at him. "Ok, Steven, I've got a room -"

"Where?" you ask him desperately, and you're peppering kisses against him now, and he's laughing with it.

"327," he tells you.

"327," you confirm, and he nods at you with a smile.

You hear an almighty bang as the finale of the fireworks plays out behind you, but you couldn't be less interested in it. Applause breaks out from the crowd around the corner, and you reach up to him and place your promise against his lips, and you push your hips up against him, and you don't think you've needed anyone as much as you need _him _right now.

"Give me half an hour," you tell him as you pull away.

"Half an hour, Steven?" he moans at you, "Jeez, I'm not sure I can wait half a minute here."

You laugh, but you know he's being serious. You kiss him one last time.

"You know I'm worth the wait," you whisper into his ear as you walk away from him, back to the crowd of people making their way back inside after the fireworks.

You don't see him collapse back against the wall as you walk away from him, heart in his throat, smile bigger than the hard on in his boxers at the thought of being with you again.

You don't hear him whisper those words as you disappear back into the wedding party.

"I love you, Steven."

-s-

You try to retain some measure of control over yourself as you pick yourself up and make your way back inside, but even with your unwavering amount of self control, you have no chance of hiding the smile Steven's just put on your face.

You saunter through the double doors leading back into the lobby, and you casually ask one of the receptionists to arrange a bottle of the finest champagne to be delivered up to your room, two glasses. She smirks at you, and you feel as if she's read your mind, and you hate how transparent you are right now because you're never like this, but you just can't bring yourself to hide how happy he's just made you.

He practically begged you to take what you wanted from him – what you've _needed _to take from him for years – and you finally had the chance to tell him how you feel. You only wish you'd said it seconds earlier than you did; you only wish you'd said it when he would have been able to hear you.

You vow to make sure he knows exactly how much you love him before the sun rises.

You might tell him – you might tell him more than once, actually – but if you don't, you'll make sure that you show him. Plenty of times. Actions speak louder than words, after all.

You head back to the function room, and as if God is trying to give you some kind of cruel slap back into reality, as you turn you walk straight into Douglas, knocking the drink from his hand.

"Jesus," you curse as some of it splashes against your crisp white shirt, and your arms are outstretched, ready for confrontation, until you look up and register who it is, and you immediately drop your aggression.

You've won against Douglas now – you don't need to fight with him anymore.

You've got Steven back.

You're sure you have.

"Oh, sorry buddy," Douglas says as he furrows those ridiculously large eyebrows of his. You frown in confusion, because you're pretty sure it was you that bumped into him, and it's his drink that was full and is now empty, and yet _he's_ apologising to _you_. How ridiculously polite of him.

"Didn't see you there," he adds.

He looks up at you, and you're sure it's fear you see in his eyes, and now you couldn't be more confused about what Steven sees in him.

"Don't mention it," you say as you sneer at him, then turn and walk away from him.

You head to the bar, grabbing yourself another whiskey because you're not sure if it's the fact you've just bumped into Steven's husband, or the fact that Steven begged you to invite him up to your room, but you can feel reality creeping back in, and it's making you question your decisions, and you need to be able to cloud your judgement a little more before you can let Steven go through with this.

You're caught, because you know that you want him – you've wanted him for so long now. You've thought about him night after night, for year upon year. He's the only man you've ever loved. He changed everything for you, and you've spent years wishing you'd had the strength to tell him all that time ago. You've spent years waiting for this moment, when you could see him again, and when he'd come back to you. You've always hoped the two of you would meet again, and you've always hoped he would fall straight back into your arms when you did.

You want nothing more than to feel him close to you again; feel his naked skin against your own; feel yourself unravel at the sensation of his touch. Feel like you haven't come close to feeling in years.

And yet, there's something in the back of your mind that's trying to stop you.

It's that same devil that's been inside of you for years, reminding you how damaged you are; how you don't deserve to be with someone like Steven.

You don't deserve to be happy.

And you sure as hell don't deserve it at someone else's expense.

As much as you hate Douglas, you know if you re-claim Steven as your own then it means Douglas has lost him, and you know it means Steven has to walk away from the life he's made for himself.

And you just can't see how you're worth all of that.

You love Steven. You love him. And you should want what's best for him.

Your problem is that you're struggling to see how that's you.

As if on cue, you spot him through the crowd on the dancefloor, and you see him talking to Douglas.

You watch him, because you need something – you need to see a crack in their perfect life. You need to see something that will take away this unfamiliar guilt you're feeling at tearing Steven's life apart. It's not like you to care – you've fucked married men before, and you've never given a seconds thought to what they're risking by being with you. But you didn't _care _about them – didn't live your life wondering if those men were _happy _in their life. You fucked them and left.

Steven is different.

You love Steven. You need him to be happy.

And you need to make sure you don't fuck him up.

You watch them intently, and you see how Douglas asks him questions, and Steven brushes him off, his eyes constantly flicking around the room as if he's looking for something. Douglas touches his arm, and Steven flinches with it, as if the gesture is unwelcome. He smiles at Douglas, and it's a smile you've never seen before – it's cold, and it's distant. It doesn't reach his eyes. Douglas accepts it and reaches up for a hug, as if he's used to seeing that smile from his husband.

You're used to a whole different kind of smile from Steven. It's a smile that fills his entire face, takes over his expression, causes the small wrinkles at the sides of his eyes to appear and is usually coupled with a flirtatious raising of his eyebrows.

You watch as the couple hug, and you notice how it looks..._awkward. _Unnatural.

Steven's eyes are still darting around the room, and then they land on you, and they stop searching.

And he gives you that smile.

The one you've been waiting for.

You smile back at him, because you see it then – you see why he's so willing to drop everything that he has to be with you again.

It's because he loves you.

The realisation hits you like a slap in the face.

Douglas is second best – always has been.

Steven loves you.

You might not have the wedding ring, or the certificate to prove it, but Steven is yours again.

And you can't wait to claim your prize.

You wink at him, and he smirks and looks away, and you down your drink and you're about to leave when Anne grabs you on the arm.

"Where've you been?" she asks, and you're aware that she knows something.

Or she thinks she does at least.

You don't answer her, because there's no point lying to her.

"Oi, Irish?" she pushes again.

"What?" you snap at her, because you know when she finds out what you've got planned she's going to try and talk you out of it.

"You're looking pleased with yourself, and you haven't took your eyes off him in a few minutes," she observes, and you hate how well she knows you. "You better not have been with him, Brendan."

"Maybe it's fate," you sneer at her, dripping in sarcasm. You've never been one to believe in all that shit, although your insides lurch with the thought of it now.

"Give over, Brendan," Anne says as she takes up residence in the chair next to yours. "You can't just mess around with someone's marriage for your own amusement -"

"It ain't just for my own _amusement_," you bite at her, and you can't believe that she's still not seeing it. She knows you, sure, and she knows you don't do sentiment and feelings – but surely she doesn't think you're totally heartless. She knows what Steven means to you.

"I know, Brendan," she concedes quietly, placing a comforting hand on your arm. "I'm sorry."

You sit with her and share a moment of silence, noticing how Steven is alone now – Douglas must have left – and he's looking across at you with intrigue in his expression. You smile because you're aware that he probably knows you're talking about him to Anne, and that he always hated it when you talked about him behind his back.

You smirk at him, and he narrows his eyes back at you in a warning, but he can't help the smile that spreads over his face a moment later, and you laugh with him in anticipation of what you both know is about to happen.

"There's no stopping you, is there?" Anne asks beside you, and you can tell by her gentle tone that she's giving up on trying to stop you when it comes to Steven.

"Not with Steven," you answer her honestly.

You never could stop yourself when he was involved. Time has changed nothing.

"Just...don't be surprised if things have changed in the morning," she warns you, and you know she's only thinking of your feelings, but you're tired of her concern. You want Steven, and you've got him, and you don't want to think of tomorrow when tonight is the only thing occupying your mind right now.

"They won't," you tell her, and you hope to God that you're right.

Anne smiles at you like she wants to believe you, before she gets up to leave, squeezing your arm reassuringly as you place a kiss against her cheek and congratulate her on her marriage.

You think about what she's just said as you get up to leave, catching Steven's eye as you do so.

You silently pray he won't change his mind – now, or in the morning, or ever for that matter.

You're pretty sure if you lose him again, you might not survive it this time.

-s-

Your whole body feels alive like it hasn't done in years, and you know it's the anticipation of what Brendan is promising you.

Even Doug standing before you asking questions about where you've been doesn't dampen your appetite for the Irishman.

You can still feel his kiss against your lips, and your body rushes with the excitement of it, and you can't let your mind think too much about what you're doing when you answer Doug's questions with outright lies and urge him to go to bed and let you carry on the party because you're enjoying yourself. You can't let yourself dwell on the fact that you're getting rid of him so that you can go to Brendan, because if you think about it too much you know the conscience that's always held you back will stop you from through with it.

And you don't want anything to stop you being with Brendan tonight.

"It's fine Doug, honestly," you hear yourself telling him, and you smile at him in the same way that you always do – like it's for his benefit and not for your own. "You've had a long day, I can tell you're tired. You go up and I'll stay down here."

"You sure you don't mind?" he asks, and you curse at how it's never usually this difficult to get him to leave a party early. It's almost midnight and well past his usual 11pm bedtime.

"Honestly, I'm sure," you tell him, and he seems to accept that, as he pulls you into a hug.

As you let his arms circle you, your eyes finally find what they've been scanning the room for. Brendan smirks as he looks back at you, and you feel a rush of excitement course through your veins as he makes you all sorts of inappropriate promises from across the room.

You see Anne approach him, and you tear your eyes away as you kiss Doug goodnight, wincing with the shred of guilt that rises up inside of you at your deceit. You glaze over it, and you watch him walk away from you, and you wonder how long you will leave it until you tell him that your marriage is over.

You can't tell him tonight, but you will tell him soon enough.

You and Brendan. Brendan and you.

That's all that matters now.

He's making eyes at you across the room, and you wish you could lip read what him and Anne are saying, because you know from her frowned expression that it'll be about you. You know why she would be concerned, but you know that she couldn't possibly understand it.

You couldn't possibly even try to stay away from him tonight.

You make your way to the bar, and you make the most of the free drinks by downing a vodka and asking for another, and you try to listen in on their conversation but you're too far away. Your body thrills at the harshness of the alcohol as it hits you, and it's not that you need the courage – not for Brendan, anyway – it's just that you're not sure your body is coping with the shock of what's happened to you in the past few hours, and the effect it's going to have on the rest of your life.

You let the sting of the alcohol pierce your senses as it makes it's way down, and you let the realisation of it all settle in. You've spent the last eight years wondering if everything with Brendan had been a dream. If he'd ever really felt about you the way you had about him. If the feelings you'd remembered so vividly had ever been anything more than a teenager mistaking lust and affection for love and desire.

You know now.

Since his kiss, and since the way he looked at you across the room earlier on as he'd seen you for the first time in years, and since he'd held you in his arms the way you've always dreamt of him doing.

You've known.

There's no-one for you besides him.

And you're about to make him yours all over again.

You watch him placing a kiss on Anne's cheek, and your eyes follow him as he moves past you on his way out of the bar, and his eyes meet yours, full of anticipation, and he smiles at you. You smile back, and you nod at him, and he winks at you and carries on.

You take a deep breath, and you down the rest of your vodka, and you slowly make your way out of the party.

You take a deep breath as you reach the lobby, making your way up the stairs on the way up to his room.

You want this more that you've ever wanted anything before in your life, and you break into a half-skip, half-run as you make your way up to him; stairs two at a time as you silently curse the hotel for seemingly making Brendan's room the furthest away from you as possible.

You reach the third floor, and you turn the corner, and you feel a solid palm against your chest, stopping you in your tracks.

You look up, and you see Amy stood before you – hand on her hip, eyes questioning you intently, clearly wondering what had gotten you in such a hurry.

Subconsciously you glance behind her, and her eyes follow your own, and the two of you watch on as you see the retreating figure of Brendan Brady letting himself into his room, with his back to you both, completely unaware of his audience.

Amy turns back to you, eyes glaring at you, expression seething with disappointment in you and what she _knows _you were about to do.

You throw your head back in frustration, because Amy knows you better than anybody, and you can see from the look she's giving you that she's working it all out in her head, and she has no doubts what you were about to do.

"No?" she questions, as if she needs her own suspicions confirming.

You stutter, and you try to answer her – try to find a way to explain why you're following him up to his room, and why you're in such a hurry to get there. You're stumped, and you suddenly can't think on your feet quick enough, and you don't even bother trying because she's seen the guilt in your eyes and she knows.

"You better not be going where I think you are," she says to you.

You slam your fist into the wall in frustration.

It looks like Brendan is going to have to wait.


	7. Chapter 7

_**Sorry for leaving you all hanging after the last chapter...**_

_**I think this will be the penultimate chapter. Well, it might be anyway, or there could be two more. Just to warn you it's coming to a close.**_

_**Reminder this story is M rated ;)**_

_**Enjoy, and thank you once again for your reviews :D**_

_**PS: Starts with Brendan's POV**_

**7**

It's been three weeks since Steven stood you up at the wedding.

Three. Fucking. Weeks.

You haven't even started to come to terms with it, how he just lead you along and let you think he'd come up after you, and then just left you waiting.

Three whole weeks.

You thought you'd be over it by now.

Jesus, who are you kidding? This is _Steven, _remember. Steven.

It'll take more than three weeks of life made hazy by whiskey, denial and self-loathing before you come to terms with the fact that he gifted you a slither of hope with his sweet-as-fucking-sugar kiss and then ripped the world from under your feet when he left you waiting in that hotel room like you had nothing better to do with your time but watch the second hand on your Rolex chasing it's tail as the sun rose.

You remember how you waited for him up in your room, pacing up and down with nervous apprehension that felt totally alien to you, and how your heart had leapt into your throat when you'd heard the knock on the door and you'd assumed it was him. It wasn't – it was the room service order of champagne that you'd almost forgotten you'd requested from reception just five minutes earlier – and an hour later you felt like throwing his glass against the wall and shattering it into a million tiny pieces; a reflection of your heart as he destroyed it for the second time.

Why do you always let him fucking _do this _to you?

You sat back and waited for the second knock at the door. You waited all fucking night for him to come to you. You should have known he would have been just playing with you; how your life must just be one long fucking joke to him; how it must have always been his favourite hobby to play around with your emotions like you were just some pawn in his little games.

You should have known when he kissed you outside that he was just trying to tempt you into believing his little show, that he needed you to believe he'd take you back before he could humiliate you properly by making you wait up in your room like a kid waiting for Christmas after the longest winter of discontent.

You should have known he'd never come back to you. He's _better _than you, after all, isn't he? And he's got everything he could want in life – his business is a success; he's got his kids; he's got Amy. He's got Douglas.

You laugh to yourself as you throw your fist into the punching bag one more time.

You laugh at yourself for ever entertaining the thought that Steven would leave his husband and his perfect life to be with you.

You laugh, because it's all you can do to try and keep it together.

You're nowhere near over it, and you don't know if you're more angry at the boy for doing it across you, or at yourself for falling for his charms all over again.

It's what brings you here now, to your early morning gym session, as it has done every morning at this time when the club's closed for the night and the sun is just about to rise and the rest of the world is still sleep drenched in their comfortable beds in their comfortable lives.

You've come here at this time every day since he broke your heart again; know you can rely on the free weights and the punching bag to never let you down when you need them. You come and you work out your pent up frustration, throwing all of your strength into every punch, raising all the aggression you can muster to allow you to lift that final rep on the kettlebell.

And you spend every minute trying to push his beautiful fucking face to the back of your mind as you're doing it.

It never happens.

The problem is – and the one thing that keeps replaying over and over in your mind, no matter how many times you try to ignore it – is that you can't shake the memory of the way he looked at you that night; the way that he smiled at you like you held the answers to everything he needed to know. You can't forget the way it felt when he kissed you; how it felt so..._real _against your lips, like it used to back when you knew that he loved you, and you wanted so badly to believe that he still felt that way about you that you let yourself fall for it.

You let yourself fall for _him_ – all over again.

And you can't match up the way he made you feel in that moment – the way he kissed you, and the way he looked up at you like he'd been waiting just as long as you had to feel the sensation of being this close to you again – you can't reconcile that with the way he left you hanging up in your hotel room, waiting for him. You'd been so sure that he wanted it too, just as much as you did.

And it isn't like you to think positively, but that one little doubt keeps surfacing in your mind. Something about it all just doesn't seem right to you, and the tiny suggestion of hope that you hide back in the recesses of your dark soul lets you believe that there must have been some reason why he didn't come for you. There must have been _something _that stopped him; something out of his control. You _know _that he wanted it – he wanted it just as much as you did – and a part of you tries desperately to cling on to that thought; that one tiny ray of hope that he didn't mean to break your heart all over again.

Sometimes, that one thought is the only thing that's keeping you sane.

Most of the time, you know it's the only thing that's holding you back.

And yet you still can't let go of it.

So you come here to the gym under the cover of darkness, and you work the anger and the despair out of you over the course of a couple of hours, joined only by those just as tortured as yourself who let you work out in your solitary mood; and when your anger is all but dissipated, you find yourself with that one single doubt nagging at you, and the uncertainty clouds your thoughts for the rest of the day.

You're at that point now – where you're not angry anymore, you're just consumed with the confusion that he's forced inside of you, and you know it's that point where you need to put the weights down and retreat, so you make your way back downstairs to the changing rooms.

You undress and you shower, letting the water drip over you like it has healing powers; like it can wash away the pain that Steven summoned up inside of you three weeks ago and replace it with contentment. You know it'll never happen though - you know you'll never feel true happiness again without him in your life.

You sigh, and you wash away the last of the sweat and tears that you've shed at his expense with your workout, and you wrap your towel around yourself and leave the shower cubicle, head bowed with the constant aura of discontent that seems to cloud you constantly now.

You're usually alone here, especially at this ungodly hour that you choose to visit, so your attention is immediately drawn to the door to your left as it swings open as you leave the showers. You break your gaze with the floor to glare at whoever's imposing on your moment of contemplation, hoping to scare them off as you're used to doing with that evil look in your eye.

And that's when you see him.

And your heart lurches – literally jumps from your chest at the sight of him.

You stop in your tracks, because every synapse in your brain is focusing on him. You're incapacitated by the sight of him.

He's fresh from the pool, and you let your eyes travel over him, slowly, taking in every exposed inch like it's the last chance you'll ever get. It's such sweet torture for you to look at him, at his perfection, as he stands there with just a towel around his waist, looking back at you with the same shock and awe that you're certain he sees in your own expression.

You can't tear your eyes from him, watching as the water runs down over his collarbone, travelling further down over his hardening nipples, wavering over those barely-there abs that you remember so well, can almost still remember the way they felt against your tongue, and the memory of it causes you to feel weak all of a sudden. You think your body is about to give up on you – think for the first time in your life your strength will let you down, and you feel behind you for the safety of the wall to support you, but you manage to support yourself for the demi-second it takes for you to sort yourself out.

And then it suddenly doesn't matter anymore.

You suddenly feel all of the strength you'd lost three weeks ago reappear in an instant.

Steven's on you, pushing against you without a moments hesitation, his body pressing up against yours, and you let yourself fall back against that wall you'd needed for support just seconds ago, and you tilt you head and kiss him back when he presses his lips up against yours.

You're not angry any more, and you're not frustrated, and you're not confused.

All of the questions you had for him – the ones that have spun around your tortured mind on a loop for the past three weeks – are all of a sudden redundant.

You don't need to ask him anything, because Steven's telling you everything you need to know in this kiss.

And you think it's the best answer you could have ever hoped for.

-s-

It feels like forever that he's stood staring at you, and you watch as his expression changes from surprise, to anger, to something you don't wholly recognise in him.

You think it might be hurt.

You hurt him.

You know you did. A tiny part of you even _hoped _that you did.

You hoped, in the twisted way that your mind works, that he _cared _enough to have let you hurt him that night. And you knew he'd think the worst of you – that he'd assume you'd stood him up. You knew because it's exactly what you'd think of him if the tables were turned.

You've wanted so desperately to get in touch with him over the last three weeks; wanted so desperately to tell him that you still want him; that it was Amy that kept you away from him at the wedding, and that it was just as painful for you to stay away from him as it must have been for him to wait for you all night.

You know you were drunk at the wedding – had every opportunity since then to blame what you did on the booze and the occasion, but you haven't been able to hide the truth from yourself.

You still love him.

You realised it that night, and you've been a man on a mission these past three weeks trying to find some way of making sure that he knows it.

After Amy's ambush that night you were so desperate to speak to him, to explain your absence to him, but he was long gone by the time Amy let you out of her sight the next morning, and you quickly realised you had no way to get in touch with him. You wanted to throttle her for trying to talk sense to you. She frogmarched you to her room after stopping you from following him, a constant flurry of expletives leaving her mouth about how she couldn't believe you'd gotten so drunk that you were about to throw away everything you had with Doug to be with him. You daren't tell her the alcohol had nothing to do with it.

As you sat in her room that night, deflecting away her questions about what the hell you thought you were doing, an uneasiness settled inside of you. It wasn't because of what she was saying to you – wasn't anything to do with the guilt you knew you should have been feeling towards Doug. Instead it was the thought of Brendan sitting in his hotel room, waiting for you to go to him, and his slow realisation that it wasn't going to happen.

You weren't sure if he would care. Deep down, you wanted to believe that he would – you thought about the way he'd looked at you, the way he'd kissed you outside, the way he'd reacted when you'd mentioned Doug's name – and you wanted to believe that he'd be sitting in his room counting down the seconds until your long awaited reunion. You just hadn't had the chance to find out for certain if he _did _care - hadn't been able to get the words out of him to let you know if you still meant anything to him.

But even without having heard the words, the feeling in your gut told you he was just down the corridor from you with his heart breaking further by the second; and the look in his eyes as you stand before him now confirms your suspicions, It kills you to think of him in that pain.

And even more so, it kills you to think that you're the cause of it all.

Again.

When you'd finally talked Amy to sleep that night, answering as few of her questions as you could get away with, you'd tried to sneak out of her room and go to Brendan. She was one step ahead of you, though – she'd locked the door from the inside, and try as you did to search for the key, you hadn't been able to find it. You were trapped until morning, and sure enough when it came around, Amy produced the key from under her pillow and let you go.

But Brendan was long gone. You even asked at reception, only to find he'd checked out at 5am.

You wonder if he'd even slept.

You were still thinking about him when you found your husband the next day, and you tried to hide the disappointment from him when you told him you'd slept in Amy's room, and you knew you weren't even lying. Not that you'd _wanted _to deceive him; not that you liked the idea of having to lie to him; but you sure as hell had wanted something to happen last night, and it hadn't been what you were explaining to him now.

After the wedding you toyed with the idea of coming clean to Doug – telling him about you and Brendan, and about the kiss. You didn't, you kept your mouth shut, but it wasn't through fear that you kept quiet.

It was disappointment, because you had nobody to leave him for anymore.

You didn't have Brendan.

And so you've tried to find him, tried to track him down, but you knew you couldn't ask around explicitly. The only people who could possibly connect you to him were Riley and Mitzeee, and there was no way you could ask either of them outright how to find him unless it got back to Doug. So you bided your time, picked up on all the hints that were dropped. You started spending more time with Riley, joined Doug when he went on his lads nights out with him, wanting to find out where Mitzeee was, who she was with, desperate for him to mention her going somewhere with Brendan.

That's how you found out last week that she had joined up as a member here at this gym, and that one of her friends who Riley wasn't keen on had recommended the gym to Mitzeee and signed her up. His name wasn't mentioned, but Riley dropped in to Doug how this friend was _"one of yours," _and you took the chance on him meaning "gay" and not "American", and you hoped it meant he was Brendan.

So the next day you joined up. You came and sat through the induction and listened to the sales spiel from the gym instructor and you signed on the line without even properly understanding what you'd agreed to. You didn't care. This was your way back to Brendan, and you weren't going to let something minor like money stand in your way.

Doug had frowned at you when you returned – wondering why the hell you'd chosen this gym over the brand new Virgin Active one down the road which was the same monthly fee but had a heated outdoor pool and fancy gym equipment and an on-site Costa Coffee which was subsidised for members. You shrugged and told him you just liked it, and he didn't argue further. He never did. As if he was scared to upset you, or something.

Sometimes you feel like telling him the best sex you've ever had is the make-up sex after the argument; that the heated passion in a relationship is what makes it even stronger; that you sometimes wish he would just answer you back and show a little bit of backbone because secretly you know it's what gets your blood boiling, in a good way.

Only you don't say anything to him, because you know he won't understand. He's never been _that _guy; you've never been _that _couple. And besides, you'd feel wrong bragging about your sex life with Brendan to Doug when you think of the Irishman every second of the day already.

So you just let him accept the fact that you've joined this particular gym for no conceivable reason, because you're not sure you're ready to tell him the truth – that you joined for the chance of seeing Brendan again, and that if that should happen, it could be the start of the end of your marriage.

And despite knowing the reason why you signed up – despite looking for him when you turn every corner, and feeling your heart beat quicker every time the door swings open in the hope that it could be him – you're still not prepared for it when you finally bump into him, and it knocks the air from your lungs and the wind right out of your sails.

He's fresh from the shower, all muscular and defined, and so _masculine _that you're practically salivating at the thought of him on you. Your marriage is the last thing on your mind.

He gives you those eyes, the one's you think only you can truly understand, and you try to find the words to say to explain to him why you hadn't gone to him that night. You try, but despite the effort you've put in to searching for him these past three weeks, you haven't once worked out what the hell you're going to say to him.

So you tell him everything you need to in the best way you know how.

You take two steps forward, closing the gap between the two of you, and you kiss him with such force that you push him back against the cold tiles of the changing room wall, and you're sure he shouldn't seem so weak when you collide into him, but you think it could be the effect you're having over him as you press yourself up against him, feeling the bristle of his chest hairs against your naked, smooth skin, and the roughness of his tongue as he licks inside your mouth. You groan with it, can't contain your bodies reaction to feeling his skin against your own once again, and you physically feel him responding to the sound of you, feel his hands around your waist, strong and determined, and you're suddenly pushed backwards, and you think he's pushing you away for a second, and your towel drops from you waist as your bodies separate, but then he comes with you, and you realise he's walking you backwards – back into the shower cubicles – and you vaguely hear the sound of the shower cubicle locking shut above the sound of your heart racing with a heady mix of trepidation and lust as he backs you up against the wall of the cubicle.

You wrap your arms around him, linking your fingers behind his neck and pulling him in closer to your kiss, and you can feel his heat warming through you, and you tingle where his hands touch your sides.

He pulls his lips away from you, and he glances into your eyes for all of a second, and you're expecting to see them full of the warmth and passion that you remember so vividly, but you're shocked to see them almost cold and mechanic. For a second, you're reminded of that night in the alleyway, after Tom's party – the last time you'd been with him like this; but then he smiles at you, and you smile back before he kisses you again, and you're confused for a short moment because it feels so _close _and yet his eyes were just so _distant, _and you hope to God he's not ever going to walk away from you again.

"Brendan," you whisper as you pull your lips away from him, and you know you need to tell him – need him to know that it's all so real for you, that you can't live without him, that you couldn't survive if he walked off and left you again; but he brings his hand up from where it holds onto your waist, and he places a finger against your lips and he shushes you as his lips connect with that sweet spot on your neck, and you lose all concentration.

His lips tease you in the best way they know how, and you groan again as he bites at the tender skin on your shoulder then kisses it better, and you part your lips and let your tongue glide against the finger he still has placed there to keep you quiet, and he pushes his finger inside your mouth, and you suck on it and bite gently on his knuckles, and he pushes against you further, and the movement of the two of you together alerts the sensor in the shower to your presence, and water starts to fall on the two of you from above.

You feel him smiling against your skin, and you laugh, and you let your hands fall down to his towel. He lets out a breath as you trace a finger along the inside of the towel, grazing his hipbone, and when you pull it away from him, slowly, and throw it over the hook on the back of the cubicle door, you see that he's naked underneath, and you're once again consumed with the need for him to use you in the best way he knows how.

He's sees it in your eyes when you tear your gaze away and look back at him – he sees the hunger and the lust and all the years of loss and frustration – and he barely waits a second before he launches himself on you, tasting your tongue and devouring you in every way, and you drag your hands down the planes of his back, over the definition of his shoulder blades and the muscles underneath, and you reach his arse and you grab onto it, pulling him towards you, as close as two people could possibly be, and you feel the full length of his erection as it rubs up against your own, and the friction is almost too much to bear, and you let out a sound of pure unadulterated passion because you just can't hold it in any longer.

He responds to it, as he always used to do, and you remember how you once apologised for being so loud when he had his way with you, and he told you how he loved hearing you enjoying yourself, and he made you promise at the time to never try to keep the noise down when you were alone together. You remember how you'd spent days afterwards smiling because he'd dared to say he _loved _something about you – even if you knew it was only the sex that made him so excited, and you knew he'd never be able to say the word to you properly.

You smile now with the memory of it, and you make no effort to keep your satisfaction quiet when you reach between your bodies and take hold of his cock, beginning to work it in that expert way that you know you have.

He stills instantly, his tongue stopping in it's circular tour of your tonsils, his lips pulling back from your own slightly until you can feel his hot breath against your tongue, can feel the movement of his body coming back and forth as you work your hand up and down his still impressive length, and you let yourself watch the arousal in his face, eyes closed, jaw slacked, mouth open and inviting.

You place a chaste kiss against his bottom lip, and another, and then you close your lips around it and you suck at it until he groans with the pain of it, and you pull away.

"I'm sorry," you say to him, and you know you're not apologising for that – you're apologising for everything. For the hotel, for Amy, for eight years ago.

His eyes open to look at you, and as if sensing the change in the atmosphere the shower reaches the end of it's timed cycle and turns itself off. He backs away from you slightly, and you slow down your assault on him when you see the change in him, and you feel cold and exposed all of a sudden without his warmth on you.

You feel like you can't read him. Like his body is telling you one thing and his eyes are telling you another.

You wish you had the words for him right now, but you can't find them, so you stand there, speechless, and you wait for him.

His eyes turn cold again, and you're scared he's going to run. But he doesn't.

He pushes you back against the wall, drops to his knees, kisses a quick trail down from your stomach until he takes the head of your cock in his mouth, and takes it down to the root.

You throw your head back, senses overwhelmed by the sensation of him, by the skill with his tongue and the constriction of his throat as he takes you all the way down. You've always had confidence in your blow job technique, but you'll happily take second place behind Brendan Brady, and you've dreamt about this for so many years that you're almost unable to believe it's actually happening.

Only you can believe it, because you look down at him and you see it all, and he's milking pleasure from you with his mouth like he was born to do it, and you try to hold on for as long as you can, but he glances up at you, and your eyes connect with his, and it feels like you're sharing something life changing with him yet again, and you let go to the release that's coursing all through your body. You sigh, and you call out his name, and you don't care that you can hear someone showering in the cubicle next to you, and you lose all strength from your body as you slide down the wall and sink to the floor; spent.

You're level with him now, and you think nothing will wipe the smile off your face, until you open you eyes and meet them with his, and you see nothing. They're cold again, and you have a moment where you know your fears are about to be realised, and your heart drops.

He stands, never takes his eyes off yours as he spits the evidence of your adultery out of his mouth and onto the floor of the shower. He's never done that before – always enjoyed the taste of you on his tongue as much as he enjoyed the taste of himself on your own tongue – and you know it's as good as him telling you he feels nothing.

He grabs his towel and leaves the cubicle; leaves your head spinning and your heart pounding, and you try to stand and follow him but your legs are weak with the heavy sense of rejection flooding through you, so you stay sitting on the floor of the cubicle, and you reach up and turn the shower on, and you let the water cover the tracks of your tears as they fall, stinging you eyes as they go.

-s-

You'd been almost ready to forget how he treated you – almost too lost in the sensation of his body up against your own, his hands working you expertly, that motion that you remember so vividly, have been desperately trying to find replicated in every one of your not-worthy fucks in the past eight years – that you let yourself get caught up in it all. Let yourself believe he could actually belong to you again.

And then he apologised to you.

And you knew exactly what it was for, and the memory of it brought you back into the present and out of this dream you'd let yourself believe for all of a few minutes, and the devastation that he left you with three weeks ago came crashing back down around you.

It reminded you of every single time he'd broken your heart.

You opened you eyes, and you looked at him, and you had never known it was possible to hate someone with as much passion as you loved them. But right in that moment, you did.

The rage burnt inside of you, and you needed him to hurt with as much depth as he'd hurt you. So you gave him what you wanted – you gave him something to remember you by, something you were sure would make him call out your name with pleasure – and then you forced yourself to make him think you were rejecting him, and you walked away from him, and it's the most difficult thing you've ever had to do.

You step over his towel on your way back to the changing room, and you cringe when you think back to a few moments earlier when it had dropped from around his body as he'd launched forwards and kissed you. You think about the look in his eyes, and the touch of his skin, and the way his body had reacted to yours. You think about the way he kissed you, and a part of you wants to go back to find him in the showers and to take him in your arms and tell him that you love him; that you'll never hurt him again.

But you can't.

You can't let him stamp out the beating of your heart again.

You've let him do that one too many times.

You dress quickly, closing your locker and leaving the gym, and as you make your way out to the car you see an image in your mind of the boy you've left in the showers. You swallow down the lump in your throat, and ignore any sentiment left in your thoughts about him.

You sit in your car for a few minutes as the faint blue light of morning makes itself known, and you lock yourself in the car to stop yourself from going back for him. You use your phone to google gyms in the area - there's no way you can come to this one again - and you make a mental checklist of where you can go.

After a few moments, you go to drive off the car park, when you see him run out in front of your car. Your heart stops for a second as you realise it's him, and you think you're going to hit him, and he turns to mouth off at you and your near miss until he realises it's you in the car. He makes his way around to your window and knocks angrily against it, urging you to wind it down.

You resist the urge to open it as you drive away from him, but you can hear his voice pleading to you as you leave, and his words echo around your car as you drive away from him in a hurry.

His words, that will haunt your dreams for the foreseeable future.

His words, that simply say...

"I love you, Brendan."


	8. Chapter 8

_**So this is not the last chapter! One more to go. And then maybe an Epilogue because I bloody love writing this story :)**_

_**Thank you once again for your reviews, they never fail to make my day!**_

_**PS I've set up a twitter account – twenteseven – and I'm already addicted so come and say hi if you haven't done already!**_

_**Enjoy the update, it's rated M ;)**_

**8**

You watch his image in your rear view mirror as you drive away from him, and you hit the brakes as you near the barrier to leave the gym car park, and you stay there for all of three seconds as you battle with yourself over what you've just heard him say.

He loves you.

He _loves_ you.

It doesn't make sense to you, and your devilish instincts tell you not to believe him. He wouldn't have left you, all those years ago, if he really loved you; he wouldn't have stood you up at the wedding if he really loved you; he wouldn't have married Douglas fucking Carter if he reallyloved you, all this time. You were always just a phone call away, weren't you? Weren't you?

If he _really _loves you, and if he really has _always_ loved you, he'd have told you sooner than this. Surely.

You can almost feel your demons taunting you, messing with the tiny slither of hope that you're battling to find amongst all the doubts, because why would a boy like him want to be with a man like you? They convince you that he's lying – that Steven's just punch drunk on the haze of his orgasm and he's just desperate for more of the same from you – that he's lying to you just so he can get you back into bed again. That he'll break your heart again if you let him, and he'll do it without even thinking twice.

So you look up at him one last time through your mirror, and you convince yourself that he doesn't look just as devastated as you did that night he broke your heart all those years ago, and you ignore the tiny ray of optimism that hides in the back of your mind telling you that he means what he says, and you put your foot down as the car park barrier rises, and you drive away from him.

You feel a shooting pain through your chest seconds later, sucking in a deep breath to steady yourself, and you can feel the tears welling up in your eyes. It's as if you're having to try so much harder than you thought in order to convince yourself that he doesn't love you. As if you know deep down, when it all comes together, that he couldn't have been lying to you – he wouldn't deceive you like that. Not again.

You just don't know if you can risk it all again – risk losing him.

These past three weeks, since you let yourself believe for those few glorious hours at the wedding that he could be yours again, since he stood you up and left you pacing your hotel room like a desperate teen on prom night – you've been a shadow of your former self. You've been unbearable – you've snapped at staff members, ripped off suppliers, phoned in every drug related incident to the police, because why the fuck shouldn't everyone else's lives get screwed up, just like yours is. You've pushed Anne away, made her feel like shit, snapped at her unnecessarily, because she might be all you have, but you still can't bear to infect her with your desolation.

And you've known all along it was Steven that made you like that – made you bitter, and resentful, and _jealous. _Because at the end of it all, nothing compares to Steven – nothing compares to the way it makes you feel when you have him in your arms, when he kisses you – and you'd been so close to feeling it all again, to being back under his spell again.

Nothing has ever compared to him, and nothing ever will. Nothing, and nobody.

But he's broken you again. He's screwed you over, again. And he's made a fool of you, again.

So you can't _let yourself _believe him now. You can't let yourself fall into his trap again, because a third time and you'd have no way out.

You can't risk him having that power over you; to be able to destroy you all over again.

You're Brendan Brady, after all.

So you grit your teeth, and you knock the car into first gear, and you tear your eyes from the image of him in your mirror, and you slam your foot on the accelerator, wheel spinning as you pull away from him.

And you don't look back, as much as it kills you.

-s-

You stop yourself from falling to the ground in despair as you watch him drive away from you. You look ahead and you see him stop, and for a glorious moment you think he's going to reverse the car and come back to you, and your heart beats faster inside your chest at the thought of it.

Only he doesn't.

He doesn't come back for you.

He stops as if to taunt you – as if to prove to you that he heard your confession, but it meant nothing to him.

And then he pulls away again – spins off in such a hurry that his wheels screech against the tarmac – and you feel your heart tear away with it.

You react on impulse, and without a seconds thought you run for your car, start the engine and pull away after him, hands shaking as you thrust your key into the ignition. There's tears falling from your eyes, blurring up your vision so you can hardly see ahead of you, but you can make out what you think is his car heading along the main road and you head out after it, wiping your tears as best you can in order to see where you're going.

You block out what just happened – block out the fact that he heard your declaration of love and carried on anyway – block out that he just heightened every single one of your senses in the showers and then spat you out like it was his ultimate signal of rejection.

You block it out, and you ignore it all, because you don't believe for one second that he doesn't still want you. You don't know if it's your blind optimism, but you remember the way he looked at you three weeks ago, and you remember the way he looked at you ten minutes ago, and you can see him when his guard is down, and you _know _he still feels something.

You hope it's the same as what he used to feel, all those years ago.

The traffic lights are annoying you as you try to follow him – other cars stopping on amber when you definitely would have driven on – and why is it when you need to be somewhere that everybody drives so slowly? You can still see him though – can see his brake lights at the next junction – and you weave between cars when the lights turn green to get you closer to him.

It's not long before you're right behind him, and you follow his every movement, desperate for him to reach his destination so you can finally talk to him again. It thrills you that you might finally find out where he lives – you know then you can get to him, whenever you need to.

You won't be in the dark anymore.

You drive for what feels like forever, but must be less than ten minutes, and you're sure he doesn't know you're following him, until he starts making last-second turnings without indication, and weaving in and out of lanes as you cross through the city centre. You suspect he's trying to lose you, but you follow his every move, the other drivers be damned.

You're not going to let something as simple as the Highway Code get between you and Brendan.

You've had enough trouble already.

It's another five minutes along a stretch of dual carriageway before Brendan finally snaps – pulling into a roadside lay-by last minute and screeching his tyres to a halt.

He's up and out of the car before you're even stationary, and when he reaches your door you see he's surprised to see you behind the wheel. You guess that he'd picked up on the person following him, but not on who was driving the car.

You suspect he's surprised that you own such a nice car, too.

He stills for a second as you lock eyes with him through your drivers side window, and you you undo your seat belt and turn off your engine. He moves back to let you open your door, but as soon as you're on your feet, he lunges towards you.

He's got both his hands bunched in the front of your polo, and he's pushing you backwards until your back connects with the side of your own car, and for a second you're scared of him and what he might do.

It suddenly hits you that you know nothing about Brendan's life, about what he's done since you both left school, other than knowing he spent some time in prison; and you realise from his aggression that there's a lot that might have changed with this man.

You still see the same soul when you look into his eyes, though.

He can't have changed too much, deep down.

"Why are you doing this?" he barks into your face as he leans towards you, towering over you as he always used to.

"Doing what, Brendan?" you ask him, voice a little higher than usual, and you hate that you sound so scared of him when you trust he wouldn't ever hurt you.

"Following me, Steven," Brendan hisses back at you, eyes searching your face as if it holds all of his answers, unaware that he could ask and you would tell him everything he needed to know. "Are you trying to take the piss?" he accuses you, and you see then that he's protecting himself with this display.

You know him well enough – or you did do, at least – to know that attack is Brendan's only form of defence.

"I just wanna talk," you say to him, voice stuttering slightly, and you bring your hands up to hold onto his arms in a gesture of understanding."Please, Brendan -"

"Is this all a game to you, Steven?" he accuses you, and you frown at him, that he could ever think you would play with his emotions like this. Did he not believe you when you told him you loved him?

"No -" you answer feebly, overwrought with confusion at the way he's treating you.

"Your favourite hobby, huh, you and Douglas," he asks you, spitting out your husband's name like it's poison on his tongue, and you see the way his eyes flash with jealousy at the thought of it. "Hey, let's make a fool out of Brendan because I haven't fucked him over enough already," he continued, his tone becoming hard, darker than you've ever seen him before.

"Why are you even saying this?" you ask him, because you know you've had your problems, and you know you left him hanging three weeks ago, but you never thought you'd see the look of disgust in Brendan's eyes that you see now, and it scares you slightly to think he might not love you back.

You'd been so sure of it, at the wedding.

"You saying it ain't true, huh?" he asks you, and there's doubt in his eyes now – hope that his paranoia is deceiving him, and hope that his demons are wrong.

You're thankful that you can still read him, when you're this close. It gives you courage.

"Course it ain't true Brendan," you tell him, and you move your hands up from where they rest against his forearms, and you trace your forefinger against the sharp cut of his jaw, and you see how he flinches into your touch, like it's instinctive for him. "I meant what I said," you add, and you watch as the light returns behind his eyes.

You try not to take it as rejection when he lets go of you then, smoothing down the creases his hands have made in your polo top, and stepping away from you as if it's physically hurting him to stay this close.

You look at him, and he looks like a broken man, and you want to know what you need to say to make him believe you.

"I meant it all," you repeat, and he looks at you then with intrigue.

"Meant what?" he urges you, like he needs to hear you say it again, needs to watch the words fall from your lips, to look into your eyes as you say them.

He needs to know if it's real or not.

"I...Brendan, I..." you stutter, because you're dumbstruck for a moment. There aren't the words in existence for you to tell Brendan how he makes you feel, and you're suddenly overwhelmed by the importance of this moment.

Fear suddenly, inexplicably, paralyses you.

You realise you've been rejected by Brendan twice today, and as much as you hope it can all be explained through the twisted form of self-preservation that you know he harbours so unknowingly inside of him, you're beginning to question everything, and you can't let yourself get hurt.

"I knew it," Brendan seethes, turning his back on you and heading back to his own car, kicking at the stones beneath his feet as he goes.

"Brendan, please!" you call out after him, as you watch him slip away from you all over again.

You watch him shake his head, and he's about to open his car door – fingers locked around the handle – when you finally find the strength to say it again.

"I love you, Brendan," you call out, and he stops dead in his tracks.

You hear the sigh fall from Brendan's lips – involuntarily, and so full of pain and anguish that it makes your heart leap into your throat, and you know it's affecting him.

If he even tries to deny it, you won't fall for it.

You can still read him like you could all those years ago – haven't forgotten the way his body betrays him, like it is now.

"I love you," you shout out after him again, and you laugh at how it just doesn't seem _enough._

He's facing away from you, and you can't see his face, can't look into his eyes; but you know you've got his full attention.

You know he can't walk away from you now.

"I never stopped loving you," you shout after him again, and you want so much for him to turn around and to see you saying it – to look into your eyes and know that you mean it, with every fibre of your being.

You've never meant anything more in your life.

His head drops, and you see his hand coming up to his face, rubbing along his eyebrows, and you know he's conflicted. You want to believe that he loves you – that the turmoil he's so clearly in right now is down to the fact that he loves you, still, and he doesn't want you to hurt him again. You need him to know you'll never make that mistake again.

The words tumble from your mouth before you can even begin to stop them.

"I've loved you since school, Brendan," you tell him, tripping over your words as they race out of you. "I loved you back then, and every day since then. I think about you all the time, always have done – all these years I've wondered what you're doing, and I've wanted to see you for so long. Some nights I'd have done anything to just have _some _way to call you, or text you, or _something. _But I had no idea where you were, and I thought you didn't care anymore after – after the alley -" your voice breaks at the pain of the memory, and he turns around to look at you.

You step forwards, standing feet away from him now, and you're sure you can see something in his eyes that you've never seen before. He looks _concerned, _like it's hurting him to see you shaken up by the memory of the one and only time he left you.

"I can't lose you again," you start over, tears threatening to fall now you know you've got his full attention. "I feel like I've waited my whole life to find you again -"

"You didn't, though, did you?" Brendan interrupts you, leaning back on his heels as if he's going to try to walk away from you again, and you see his expression turn cold again.

"Didn't what?" you ask him, and it keeps his attention.

He stands and stares at you, looking into your eyes like he's trying to learn you all over again. There's cars rushing past you both as you face each other in this lay-by, the rush of normal life carrying on whilst you stand here feeling like your life is hanging in the balance; like the whole world could end should either of you say the wrong thing.

It feels so delicate, so precious, so precarious this thing between the two of you.

You've never felt so responsible for something, and it scares you – it scares you that it's just you and Brendan in this, and you have the ability to hurt each other more than you could every hurt anybody else.

"Didn't what, Brendan," you ask him again, because he's not answering you, and you need to know what you did that was so wrong. "Didn't what?"

"You didn't _wait, _Steven," Brendan answers you, and he's so quiet you can barely hear him above the passing cars, but you're only focusing on him so you hear him clear as day. "You moved on so easily, didn't you Steven?" his voice takes on a sinister tone as he spits the words out at you, "You married Douglas -"

"You didn't want me!" you shout back at him, and you can't believe he's holding it against you, that he could be bothered that you tried to move on all those years ago.

You thought that was what he wanted.

He walks towards you, though, and he's so close that you can feel his heat against your chest, and it makes your skin tingle, and you hold your breath to hear what he's about to tell you.

"I always wanted you, Steven," he says to you, and he looks into your eyes as he says it, and you have no doubt inside of you that he means every word. "Always."

You swallow down hard, and your heart beat quickens as you think about what he's telling you. Does he mean he still wants you? Because it sure as hell feels like it by the way he's looking at you right now.

You take the plunge, and you lean up to kiss him, and you think for a second that he's leaning into you too.

But then he moves away from you; steps backwards, shuffles his feet and takes in a deep breath. He looks like he's fighting a battle to stay away from you, like he doesn't feel that he can trust you, and you know you need to push him, to make sure he believes that you love him.

Suddenly nothing is as important to you as making him believe it.

"You honestly think I wouldn't have waited if I thought there was anything to wait _for_?" you ask him, because you're starting to think that he's pinning the eight years of silence onto you and you alone, like it was all your fault, like he'd given you every opportunity to take him back. But he hadn't, had he? He'd pushed you away; he'd forced you to move on from him, as best you could.

But you would never had endured it if he hadn't made you think there wasn't anything there for you to fight for.

You would have always fought for him.

"No man has ever come close to you, Brendan," you tell him, and even you're shocked by your own sincerity. You watch his reaction, see the way his chest rises and falls with the breath he has to catch, see the way a hint of a smile starts to grace his lips, and you feel like you're finally getting through to him.

"I've thought about you all this time, Brendan," you tell him, and you drop your tone like you only want him to hear your confession, even though there's nobody else around. "I thought you hated me, I thought you didn't want anything to do with me – I thought you'd run a mile if you ever saw me again, or worse, that you'd just blank me, or do something to hurt me like I hurt you. I thought I was dead to you -"

"You could never be dead to me, Steven," Brendan interrupts you, like he needs you to know that you've always been _something _to him.

"I would never have...with Doug," you start, but he winces, and you can't finish your sentence. You know he gets your drift.

"And then at the wedding," you continue, "I saw you, and I...I panicked, yeah, a little bit. Because you were there, and Doug was there, and I wanted everything to be normal and civil and mature and all that. But you kept looking at me, like you did back then. And I couldn't help it – I realised what I've known since high school, what I've always known. And with you there in front of me I couldn't hide it any more, like I can't now."

You take a deep breath, and you go for it again.

"I'm still in love with you."

The silence settles between the two of you, and you watch him. You're waiting for an answer, a reply, an acknowledgement; anything.

"I never stopped loving you, Brendan -"

"Then why didn't you come for me?" he interrupts, voice raised as he asks you, fraught with emotion.

You realise it's the question that's been on his mind all along, and he shakes his head as if he's contemplating whether he should have even asked you his question, but you feel like there's more, so you keep quiet and you force it out of him with your silence.

"Why didn't you come for me, at the wedding, Steven? What happened?"

You can't help but laugh slightly under your breath, because you can't believe you hadn't told him sooner – you should have known it would be that night hanging over his head. You see his head drop, though, so you stop laughing, and you understand a little bit now – you know that he thinks you left him there on purpose, because you know the way his mind works, and you smile a little bit despite it all because you start to believe he actually cares about this.

"I did," you tell him, closing the gap between the two of you again, and this time he doesn't pull away from you. He lets you come in close to him, to tell him what you know he isn't expecting to hear. He quirks his head towards you, looks you right in the eye as he invites your explanation.

You laugh again, because you realise it's what's made him so cold with you today – the fact that he thought you stood him up at the wedding.

If only he knew how much you'd ached for him that night, and every night since then.

"It was Amy," you explain to him, and you're desperate to reach out and touch him, but you don't know if you're allowed to, yet. "She stopped me, saw I was following you up to your room, and she locked me in her room all night to stop me from running to you, and when I finally got out you'd checked out."

You watch his expression as your words sink in – as he realises you wanted him all along.

"I've been trying to find you ever since, Bren," you continue. "You think it's a coincidence I joined that gym?"

The realisation hits him, and you see the smile form across his face.

"You knew I joined there?" Brendan asks you, and you smile with him, and it feels like you've finally made it back to where you were three weeks ago.

"I knew Mitzeee did on the advice of her 'gay mate'," you explain to him, making quote marks with your fingers as you do so, and you can tell he's still a little bit in shock because you know he's always so sure of himself when he's convinced himself on something, and you know despite how happy he seems that he's got this one wrong, he's at least a tiny bit annoyed that his assumptions were wrong. "I hoped it was you that Riley was referring to."

You try to gauge him for a reaction, because you're so sure that you're getting somewhere – that he wants all of this just as much as you do – but you've got the image of him walking away from you, and driving away from you, plaguing the back of your mind, haunting you, and you don't want to make any assumptions.

He doesn't keep you waiting long – just a few tortuous seconds where you're scared he's going to walk away all over again.

Only he doesn't.

He doesn't walk away from you this time.

In the blink of an eye, he surges forwards, wraps his hands around your neck and pulls you closer to him, letting out a groan of pure need as he kisses you, violently, passionately – and you're so desperate for it you think it could finish you.

You kiss him back, letting out a whimper as you taste him against your tongue, and god how you've missed the way he kisses you like he really means it. You run your hand up the full length of his lean, muscular back, and you pull his chest closer against yours when you reach his shoulder blades, and he feels more than incredible when he's pressed against you like this, and you open yourself up to him and let him take whatever he wants from you.

You realise how you're nothing when you don't have Brendan, and now you feel complete that you've got him again.

You don't plan on ever letting go this time.

He pushes into you, grinds his groin against your own, and your senses are sparked into life, more aware of his proximity that they ever have been before, and when he prises his lips away from yours, you feel actual pain at the loss of him.

You think he's having second thoughts, but you open your eyes and stare into his, and you know he's never going to let you leave him again.

"Follow me home," he whispers, so close that his breath is setting fire to your lips, and he leans in and sucks on your bottom lip before he pulls away from you and waits for your response.

You see him falter, and it looks to you like he's still not sure how you will answer, and you're reminded of how frustrating it always was to get Brendan to believe how you actually felt about him, because there's no way he should be doubting how much you want this.

He looks like he's scared that if he lets you get back into your car, you'll leave him.

As if you'd ever consider letting him walk away from you again.

You smile, and you see him soften slightly, relaxing almost.

"Follow me, Steven," he asks again, and your smile widens even further.

"Ok," you say to him, and you're almost giddy with excitement at the thought of it, and he cracks a smile of the rarest form as far as Brendan's concerned.

He walks backwards towards his car door, never letting his gaze leave yours, and when he reaches his car he darts inside, starts the engine within seconds, and pulls away.

You follow him in a heartbeat, and the smile doesn't once leave your face as your filthy mind races with images of what you're about to let Brendan Brady do to your body.

-s-

You barely make it through your front door with the boy before you've backed him up against the wall, took his face in your hands and held him close to you as you kiss him. A thrill rides up your spine, intensifies everything you feel, and you can't deny how much you've missed his touch, missed the hunger in your eyes when you're close to him like this.

He wants it – you can tell he wants all of this just as much as you do – and it's enough to make you forget about anything else in the world besides the two of you.

He's grabbing at your clothes, and he's trying to push you backwards but you're stronger than him, and you remember how he likes to be shown who's boss, so there's no way you're going to let him take charge with this.

You grind harder up against him, pushing him back into the wall by your front door, and you're willing to rip his clothes off and take him right here and now, but a part of you wants more than that.

A part of you – some sentimental part you've never known even existed before Steven – wants to make sure you do this right.

So you release him for all of a half-second to let him pull your hoodie up over your head, your t-shirt going with it and exposing your pale chest to him, and as you go back into his kiss you hear him groan at the sight of you, and you pull him towards you. You tingle at the touch of his hands against your chest, fingers lacing through your hairs, and it makes you all kinds of unreasonable as you direct his stumbling feet backwards towards the stairs, pulling at his clothes as you go.

He continues to kiss against your lips like he physically cannot let you go again, and he goes to tear off his own clothes but you stop him, want to take the full pleasure of unzipping his tracksuit top, and you growl at him as you do so. You wonder if he remembers when you flirted with him over how you fantasise over him in his chavvy get-up, and then you fantasised some more about him out of it too.

He laughs into your kiss as he reaches the top of the stairs, and you think it might be because he _does _remember, and it makes you feel warm inside. He grabs for you, unhooking your belt buckle and unbuttoning your jeans without ever breaking the connection of his lips on yours, and he's looking at you now – eyes open as he devours you – and you take it as a green light for you to pull down his tracksuit bottoms alongside his boxers.

You grind into him as you press your body against his own, and he walks backwards until he hits your bedroom door, and you suddenly realises that Steven is _here, _and he's _naked, _and he's _beautiful. _The most beautiful man you've ever seen.

More beautiful that your memories could ever picture him.

Nothing could ever do justice to the curve of his spine as it rides down his back, or the dip in his hipbone as it frames his deliciously awkward torso, or the ever-so-slight upturn to his perfect little nose.

You can hardly believe he's back in your life again.

You feel like the luckiest man alive.

He's naked now, and you push against him, but he pushes your hips away from his and he tugs at your jeans and your boxes until they're puddled around your ankles, and you step out of them with fervour as he slows down the kiss he's gracing you with and opens his eyes, staring at you with such suggestion that your ever growing erection can hardly handle it.

"You sure about this, Steven?" you ask him, because you need him to be – you need him to be doing this with his eyes wide open, because you can't let him run away from you once you've opened the door he's currently leaning against.

And when he answers you, he takes your breath away.

"I'm sure," he says, and then he brings his hands up to your neck, and he holds the sides of your face, and he makes sure you're looking right into his eyes when he finishes his sentence.

"I love you, Brendan."

He says it so casually now – almost too casually – and it catches you off guard once again.

You've waited so long to hear him say it again, and you finally think you might actually let yourself believe it, for the first time.

He loves you.

He fucking loves you.

You want to say it back – you know you feel it – but the words stick in your throat.

You'll show him, though.

You show him how much you love him, when you wrap your hands around his waist and lift him up, encouraging him to wrap himself around you like he always used to, and you'd forgotten how incredible it feels when his body just _fits _into place alongside yours, like he was cut from the other half of the same mould as you were.

His body locks into place against your own, and you're overwhelmed, because you thought you'd lost your chance at ever gaining entry to heaven a long time ago, and yet here you are with the boy in your arms, and you've never been closer to perfection.

You reach down and turn the handle, and you open the door, and you kick it closed behind you as you head towards your bed.

He kisses you then, and it's more than it was before – it's more urgent, more needy – as if he's found another gear and he's throttled the two of you into it, and you're hungry when you see the look in his eye that lets you know that he wants you, just as much as you want him.

You throw him down on the bed, and you stand back for a minute and you look at him, and you take in every inch of his beautiful body because you're still not convinced you'll ever have him like this again. You see his eyes tracing over your skin, and you know he's matching up what he's seeing with the image of you in his memory, like you are with him.

You wonder if he's thinking the same thing you are.

That there's no way the picture in your mind of him is anywhere near as intoxicating as the sight of him stretched naked before you like he is now.

He sits up then, impatient, and he wraps his arms around your naked torso and he pulls you down on top of him, and you kiss him again with a hunger you'd long thought impossible to replicate.

He's impatient now, you can tell, and he knows exactly what he wants, and he's pulling you on top of him, spreading his legs and letting you settle between them, and you remember how his pushiness in the bedroom was always one of the things that you loved most about him, all those years ago.

You wonder if you'll ever be able to say those words to him – the one's he'd been brave enough to say to you today.

You hope that soon enough, you will.

In the meantime, you're going to show him just how much he means to you.

You know his body – you remember everything, because you've never let yourself forget. You've lain awake for hours in this very bed, thinking what you'd do if he ever let you get your hands on him again.

You've pictured how you'd touch him, how you'd tease him long into the night with all the things you remember him begging you for, time after time; and you've thought about how you'd drag out his orgasm, bring him so close to the edge that he'd be literally begging you to give in to him, and you'd have him eating out of the palm of your hand like he always used to, and afterwards he'd never even consider walking away from you again because you'd have given him the best night of his life.

But you know you can't live up to that right now. You can't take your time with him, and you haven't got the strength to wait for it yourself.

You need him, and you need to hear him calling out your name, and you need him to make you feel like no man has ever come close to doing since him.

You can't find the patience within you to control yourself right now, not when he's writhing around below you, and he's kissing you like he is, and he's groaning and whimpering and whispering your name against your skin; and not when he's touching you, running his delicate hands all over your body, senses heightening like you've found a whole new level of need.

Not when he's dragging his hand between the two of you, and he's grasping your cock the way he's doing right now, and he's sucking in his breath as he holds you like he can't quite believe he's getting to touch you again, like his breath is taken away at the size of you, and you see a smirk cross over his lips, and you feel him spreading his legs as if to encourage you closer, and you take the hint from him.

You don't even care if it's him leading you now.

All you care about is burying yourself deep inside of him, and spending the rest of your life making up for the eight years of lost time between the two of you.

He's keening for you, you can tell, and you can't hold him off any longer. He's working your length like he was born to do it, born to touch you and only you, but his hand isn't enough for you any more, and you need to feel him all around you, closing in on you. You need to be inside him again.

You trail your hand up the length of his lean, naked body, almost purring at the angles of him, at the complete and utter perfection of him, and you slide your finger inside his mouth, and he slurps and sucks along, eyes connected with yours the whole time. You let him coat your fingers well, then you pull your hand away, and you reach between his parted thighs and you find his tight heat. You trace your finger lightly around his rim, and you push gently against him, easing past his muscle, and he winces slightly as you do so, and you feel as if he hasn't been breached in so long by the way he looks up at you, like he's not used to it.

You don't ask him – don't want to ask in case you're wrong and you don't want to know where Douglas has been – but you lean in, and you kiss him lightly; reassuring him. You know he wants you – his body is telling you so in every way it knows how – so you push in against it, and you feel his body tensing up, but he groans out your name in that way that you remember, and you know it means that he wants you; that he wants this.

You work him open gently at first, but he starts kissing against you with more hunger, and he starts grabbing at your skin all over, and he starts pushing back down on your finger, and you know he wants more.

You slide another finger in, working him up and down, opening him up for you, and he's whimpering for you now, crying out your name, begging you for more so you give it to him, thrust your fingers inside of him with more vigour, feeling his hips writhing against you, and you can hardly contain yourself for much longer, and you need to be inside of him.

You're not sure if he's ready for you yet, but you pull your fingers away from him, and he looks up at you, and he stares into your eyes, and he says the one thing you need to hear to send you over the edge.

"Fuck me, Brendan," he begs, and your insides turn to dust, and you mind goes blank but for one thought.

You throw your hand out and pull open your bedside drawer, shuffling through everything to find the lube and condoms, and you rip open the packet and sit up on your knees as you roll one over your rock solid length. You coat yourself with lube, and you barely pause for a second before you're back between his legs, pulling one of them up onto your shoulder, lining yourself up with his puckered hole.

"Please," he begs you again, and it's all you need to hear.

You sink into him, slowly, and your world comes back to life.

You feel a heat you're not familiar with coursing through your body. Your breath stops in your throat at the sight of him below you, naked and sweat drenched and coming apart at the sensation of you pounding inside of him. You hear him groaning for you, calling out your name, and you're so close already it's almost embarrassing.

You're watching him, and he takes your breath away, and you can feel yourself inside of him, and you're awestruck with how much you could love another person.

It's a feeling that's always been totally alien to you; and yet, in this moment, with Steven, it feels like the most natural thing in the world.

He calls your name again, and you can tell that he's close, and you reach between your slickened bodies and you take his cock in your hands, and seconds later he's coming for you, calling out your name, telling you he loves you all over again, and you can feel the sensation of his orgasm as it ripples through him, his body responding to you in every way it knows how, and his muscles are tightening around you as you pound into him over and over, relentlessly, as if you're working out all the pain and devastation of the past eight years with all the strength you can muster.

Seconds later you're coming in a haze of Steven's afterglow, groaning as he milks the orgasm out of you, and you drop your body against his, and you lie there on top of him, and you try to regain your breathing, because he's just taken your breath away in more ways than one.

You're sure the last ten minutes have just changed your life forever.

And when you've lain in his arms for long enough, you pull out of him, and you tie up the condom and throw it away, and when you come back to bed he flings an arm over your chest, and he kisses your shoulder repeatedly – tiny, little pecks of pure affection.

You want to let yourself believe that it means he's not going anywhere.

You don't want to have to ask him if you're wrong, but the thought's swimming round your mind, and it's ruining what could be the best day of your life so far.

You can't not say something – you can't not be sure that this is it for him now.

"So what happens now?" you ask him, and you half dread the answer, because whatever he says to you now, your life as you know it is over. "You run back to Douglas?"

You don't mean for it to sound as bitter as you know it sounds, and you half expect him to kick off at you for ruining the moment, for bringing up the elephant in the room.

But he doesn't, so you turn to look at him, and he's lying on his back beside you, and Jesus if he's not still the most beautiful thing you could ever imagine. All these years, you've thought you could have been exaggerating it in your memory – remembering him as some HD version of himself, too perfect for reality, a cruel trick of your mind to make sure you didn't ever get over him.

But now he's here, beside you, loving you.

And he's even more beautiful than you remember.

He smiles at you, and you feel a lump in your throat, and you swallow it down as you sigh heavily with satisfaction as you roll onto your side and give him your full attention.

You think he's ignoring the question – assume he's putting off telling you that it was all a mistake and he's got to leave – but he seems far too relaxed to be trying to wriggle away from you. He seems far too happy in your company to want to leave.

And when he smiles again, and leans up to catch your lips in a lingering kiss, you know that Douglas doesn't have a chance any more.

He confirms it as he pushes you back, climbing on top so he's straddling you, and you can feel that he's hard all over again.

He leans down, and whispers his allegiance seductively into your ear.

"I ain't going anywhere."


End file.
